


Soon your friends are more like family

by EnchantingWriting



Series: The Adventures of the Ridiculously Large Jacobs Family and Co. [3]
Category: Newsies - All Media Types
Genre: AU - Large Family, Adoption, Canon-Typical Violence, Crutchie-centric, Davey's family has connections to the Irish Mob, Gangs, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Irish Language, Irish Mob, Let Crutchie Say Fuck, Poverty, Yiddish
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-14
Updated: 2018-09-08
Packaged: 2019-06-27 11:33:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 20,453
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15684603
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EnchantingWriting/pseuds/EnchantingWriting
Summary: “Sir, there’s an angry pregnant woman asking for you at the front gate. What do I tell her?”Warden Snyder looked up at his guard again. “What?”----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------For years, Crutchie only thought he needed Jack and the other newsies to get by. But, as he spends more and more time with Davey's family, he starts to wonder if there is something missing in his life. Meanwhile, the Jacobs family start becoming more and more attached to the boy Davey keeps bringing around. When Crutchie gets thrown into the Refuge, what lengths will the Jacobs family go to in order to get him out?Or, alternatively, How Davey's Family Accidentally Adopted Crutchie Morris





	1. Chapter 1

Crutchie always ate dinner with Jack. They always ate just before dark so they wouldn’t go to bed with an empty stomach. Even if they had to eat stuff he found in the trash or stale, hard bread, Jack always made sure the two of them had dinner. Always.

Except for one night. Jack had taken an interest in two new kids, brothers, earlier in the Crutchie thought they looked Jewish, but he couldn’t tell. David and Les were Jewish names, right? Anyways, when Jack never came back, he and Race split a potato and each got a sausage for dinner from street vendors that night before heading back to the lodging house. Both had made their fifty cents. They always set twenty-five aside for tomorrow’s papes and a nickel to pay Kloppmann’s fee. Crutchie usually spent a dime a day on food, but could tighten his belt eat on a nickel a day if he did not sell all his papes. He always did his best to save a dime a day. Right now he had ten dollars saved up, an amount he was immensely proud of. Jack called it his “Santa Fe dough.” Mr. Kloppman kindly kept Crutchie’s money in the lodging house safe.

Since it looked like it was about to thunderstorm, Crutchie opted to sleep inside instead of on the roof. Kloppmann charged two cents to sleep on the roof rather than a bunk. Crutchie opted for that when he was short on pennies.

Crutchie couldn’t fall asleep, worried about Jack wandering the streets at night. He eyed the old clock on the wall, and saw it was near eleven. He was starting to panic. Cowboy Kelly could take care of himself, sure, but he still fretted. What if Jack had gotten mugged? What if those Jewish brothers were bad news? What if—

That’s when the door creaked open, and Jack came creeping into the bunk room. He held a small bundle wrapped in rags. Crutchie practically jackknifed up in bed when he saw his best friend. Jack put a finger to his lips and dropped the bundle in Crutchie’s lap.

“I got some bread and half a potato for you. Davey, the new kid, and his brother Les invited me back to their place for dinner. Their ma—she’s a mick like me—she says, ‘Ye’re much too skinny, laddie,’ and she gives me the leftovers, just like that, even though they’s poor as pigeons. Nicest family youse ever’ll meet, Crutch,” Jack whispered, all in a rush.

“Thanks, Jackie, that’s real kind of you. Now, youse gotta hush, you’ll wake the fellas,” Crutchie scolded, even though he was only thirteen and Jack was sixteen. He stuck the bundle under the pillow for breakfast tomorrow. “So is it just Davey an’ Les an’ their ma?”

“Naw, they got a pop and eight other brothers and sisters! Dave’s younger sister, Sarah, she’s a really pretty lass, ‘cept she’s only thirteen.” Jack sighed dreamily.

Crutchie shook his head. “Go to bed before ya wake up the fellas,” Crutchie told Jack.

“Already has,” Race muttered from the bunk on Crutchie’s left, half-asleep. Jack shoved a fist in his mouth to muffle the sounds of his laughter, and then collapsed on the top of Crutchie’s bunk and crashed.

* * *

 

About a week later, Jack introduced Davey and Les to Crutchie, and Crutchie knew the two brothers would soon be fast friends of his. So when Davey invited Jack to eat dinner at his place for the second time, he extended the invitation to Crutchie. Crutchie and Jack protested, knowing Mr. and Mrs. Jacobs had a lot of mouths to feed, but Davey waved them off.

“All Mam has to do is add water to the soup,” he said.

Finally, they agreed when Les gave them puppy dog eyes. Crutchie couldn’t refuse the tiny nine-year-old. 

It took about twenty minutes to get to the Jacobs’ tenement. Crutchie steadfastly limped forward, moving as fast as he could. By the time they got to the apartment, his leg felt like an aching lump of meat. He rubbed it a bit, wincing. Jack shot him a concerned look, but Crutchie shook his head. “I’s fine,” he said with an easy grin. He hoped it didn’t look like a grimace.

“For sure?”

“For sure,” Crutchie promised.

“It’s four flights of stairs, ain’t too bad,” Les said. Crutchie hauled himself up the stairs to the front stoop, and was then greeted with a set of dark, narrow stairs. His bum leg felt even more achy and meaty. Jack shook his head and squatted down.

“Get on,” he said.

Crutchie flushed. “No, I can do this. Youse ain’t carryin’ me.”

“Yes I is. I wants to go eat dinner, and these stairs are too narrow for you to navigate with the crutch,” Jack said. His tone left no room for argument. Crutchie sighed. He handed his crutch to Les and Jack hoisted him onto his back.

This was humiliating. Jack hadn’t done this in over a year. He was _thirteen_ now, nearly a man. He did not need Cowboy Kelly carrying him like he was a baby or something. Crutchie resisted the urge to bury his face in Jack’s neck.

Davey and Les followed behind. Finally, they reached the fourth floor. Jack was practically panting at that point. Crutchie slid off his back, took the crutch from Les, and peered down the dimly lit hallway. It was lined with narrow doors, the wallpaper was peeling, and it smelled funny. However, Crutchie didn’t judge where Davey and Les lived. _He_ lived in a five-cent-a-night flophouse, after all.

Davey took them to a doorway and knocked real hard on it. Crutchie could hear quite the racket coming from the inside. Half a minute later, a tiny girl barely out of toddlerhood yanked the door open. She yelled something in what Crutchie thought was Polish, but he wasn’t sure. She proceeded to launch herself at Davey, who scooped her up and propped her on his hip. He planted a kiss on her black curls, and she wrapped her arms around his neck.

“That’s Lottie. Second youngest, just turned four,” Les said. He opened the door wider. A gaggle of girls—four of them—sat at a table that took up a third of the narrow living room/kitchenette. A narrow hall led to what Crutchie assumed were two bedrooms. Another girl, around Crutchie’s age, stirred something at the stove in a big pot. She wore a stained apron that’s too large for her. All five Jacobs sisters turned to stare at the arrivals.

“David and Les are back!” the girl at the stove said loudly. She grinned at him. “Jack’s back, too!”

Davey’s grin, if possible, gets even wider. “Girls, you know Jack already. This fella here is my pal Crutchie. Crutchie, these are all my sisters—Sarah, Lou, Essie, Ellie, Susan, and Lottie.” Each girl waved as their names were said.

One, Ellie, giggled a bit. “What kinda name is Crutchie?” she asked. Crutchie flushed a bit. Essie, one of the older ones, smacked her on the shoulder.

“Don’t be rude, Ellie! _I_ think it’s unique.”

“What’s unique mean?” Susan asked.

“Means special,” Crutchie said. “At least, I thinks it does.”

“It does,” Davey confirmed. He turned to Sarah. “Can you add more water to the soup, please?”

She saluted to him. “Yes, sir!”

David rolled his eyes and led Crutchie and Jack to the table. Two roughly hewn, long benches sat on each long side of the table, while two mismatched chairs were crammed on each short side. Jack and Crutchie each got their own chairs. The girls all crammed onto one bench, and Davey and Les took a seat at the other.

“Are you a newsie, Mr. Crutchie?” Susan asked with wide eyes.

“You bet I am,” Crutchie said. “You got a job, Miss Susan?”

“I sell flowers and ribbons. I makes eight cents a day,” she boasted.

Crutchie let his jaw drop. “So we’s got a workin’ girl right here!” he exclaimed. He glanced around at the other Jacobs sisters. “Do the other Misses Jacobs work?”

“We all sell flowers and ribbons, too. All except Lottie and Sarah. Sarah works at the factory with Mam, and Lottie ain’t old enough to work yet. In three years, she can be a flower girl, too,” Essie said. 

Lottie crossed her arms. “I wanna be a newsie!”

Ellie giggled. “Girls ain’t newsies, silly! Only boys are newsies.”

Lottie stuck out her bottom lip, and tears began to well in her eyes. Davey was about to stand up, presumably to prevent the brewing temper tantrum, when Crutchie said, “Y’know, Miss Lottie, there’s plenty of goils who’re newsies. My friend Smalls, she’s been sellin’ as long as I’s can remember. There’s plenty of newsgoils, don’tcha fret.”

Lottie’s eyes shined. “Really?”

“You betcha,” Crutchie said with a wink. A minute later, Lottie crawled onto his lap and demanded to hear stories about Smalls the “newsgoil”.

Fifteen minutes after Jack and Crutchie arrived, a tired-looking woman with braided brown-blonde hair and freckles emerged from one of the bedrooms, a baby on her hip. Essie got up to take the baby and place him in a rickety highchair with faded yellow paint. Jack and Crutchie snatched off their caps.

Davey got up to hug the woman. “Mam, you know Jack already. This is my pal Crutchie. Crutchie, this is my mam.”

Crutchie tried to haul himself up, but his leg was shaking too much to do it. “How d’you do, Mrs. Jacobs?” he asked, trying to sound all polite.

“I’m quite well. It’s good to meet you. My children’s friends are always welcome,” Mrs. Jacobs said with an Irish brogue. Odd—her kids all looked Jewish, with their dark curls and calf brown eyes. Only Sarah looked like her, and not even that much. She had freckles just like her ma, but she had dark eyes and hair as well. The family resemblance amongst the Jacobs siblings was uncanny. Crutchie supposed they all took after their dad. “Pardon me, but did David call ye ‘Crutchie’?”

“Yes, ma’am. It’s what all the newsies call me.” Crutchie gestured to the crutch on the wall. Mrs. Jacobs studied it with an intense curiosity that Crutchie found to be pretty bizarre.  

“Have ye got a proper name, lad?” Mrs. Jacobs asked. She didn’t sound unkind, though.

“Hans-Alexander Morris,” Crutchie finally said. He rarely used his name at all, preferring his newsie name a lot more. “In school, my teacher called me Alec. Said my name was too German for her tastes.”

Mrs. Jacobs took a step closer to him. “How do you get around with the crutch, Alec?” She hesitated for a moment, and then continued on. “Is it…hard?”

“At first it was. Had to build up the muscle and such. It ain’t too hard, though, once you get the hang of it.”

Mrs. Jacobs turned to Davey. “We should get your dad a crutch. Are they expensive?”

Jack, who had been unusually silent up until this point, said, “Some nun gave it to him three years back, ma’am. She worked in a hospital or somethin’. I ain’t sure ‘bout the price, but it ain’t cheap, that’s for sure.”  

“I bet Fr. McNally can find somethin’. God always provides,” Mrs. Jacobs muttered, half to herself.

“Why’s your pop need a crutch, Dave?” Crutchie asked.

Davey sent a nervous look back towards the bedroom doors. “He got hit by a truck on the job almost two weeks ago. Messed up his leg bad. They fired him since he’s pretty much useless to them now. We got it splinted, but the doctor told us yesterday that it’s probably not gonna heal right. The break’s really severe,” he said in a low voice.

“That’s why we started as newsies,” Les added.

“Sorry to hear that,” Crutchie said. His heart went out to his fellow crip. At least he had a wife and plenty of kids to look out for him.

“That’s tough luck,” Jack added. “Ain’t right of ‘em to fire your pop like that.”

Sarah murmured, “Dinner’s ready. Essie, you bring a plate to Pop.”

Mrs. Jacobs glanced up. “No. It’s not good for Harry to eat by himself and be stuck in that room all day. Last night Dr. McKinley said that your dad could start puttin’ weight on his leg. Davey, you an’ your friend Jack go help him sit at the table. Alec, may my husband use your crutch?”

“Of course, ma’am,” Crutchie said.

Davey and Jack stood up. They disappeared into one of the bedrooms. Crutchie heard a muffled conversation in some language he didn’t recognize. It wasn’t Polish, that was for sure. It sounded almost like German, but Crutchie could speak German so he knew it wasn’t that.

“What’re they sayin’?” he asked, feeling dumb. “What language is that?”

“Yiddish,” Ellie said.

“Ain’t that Jew-speak? Ain’t youse Irish? I never met no Irish Jew.” Crutchie furrowed his brow.

“My husband’s Jewish,” Mrs. Jacobs said softly. “My bairns’re Catholic, though, like their mam.”

“I’m a Catholic, too,” Crutchie said so that he could fit in. He furrowed his brow. He faintly remembered the strong aroma of incense, his ma putting a white veil on every Sunday, the priest chanting in some language called “Latin,” and then he’d give a sermon in German so the rest of the congregation could understand. He remembered lots of kneeling and bowing. Crutchie hadn’t been in any church since his ma died, though, and he wasn’t planning on going back anytime soon.

“That so?” Sarah cocked her head a bit. Just then, the bedroom door flew open and a man with black hair and a thick beard appeared in the doorway. He wore a worn undershirt and shorts. One leg was splinted and wrapped in white bandages. Mr. Jacobs’ face and arms were scraped up and bruised. Dark circles made purple shadows under the man’s brown eyes. Crutchie’s crutch was shoved into his one armpit, and his other arm was wrapped around Davey’s neck for support. Jack followed awkwardly. David seemed to be supporting all of Mr. Jacobs’ weight. It only took seven strides to cross the small front room. Mr. Jacobs practically collapsed in his chair. He handed the crutch to Davey, who went and leaned it against a wall.

“Thanks, son. And you, too, Jack,” Mr. Jacobs said in a New York accent

“Of course, Pop,” Davey said. At the same time, Jack said, “You ain’t gotta thank me, Mr. Jacobs.”

Sarah got up. “I’ll dish the food. Mam, you sit, you was watchin’ the little ones all day. Lou, you help me.”

Lou got up, and the two girls began to ladle the soup into chipped bowls. It had potatoes, onions, lentils, and some kind of broth in it. Thick slices of homemade bread were placed in each bowl. Crutchie’s mouth watered.

Mr. Jacobs turned to Crutchie. “You must be the fine lad who so kindly lent his crutch to me,” he said. “What might you be called?”

“Alec,” Crutchie said. “But most folks call me Crutchie, sir.”

“A fittin’ nickname, it seems. Thank you, Crutchie,” Jacobs said with a slight grin. When Lou placed a bowl and spoon in front of him, he picked up the spoon to eat.

“Henryk Jacobs! I’d smack you upside th’ ‘ead if ye wasn’t ‘urt already!” Mrs. Jacobs cried. “Wait till we says grace.”

“I’m Jewish, love,” he said with a bit of a grin. Jack tried to smother his laughter by fake coughing into his arm. “I say it _after_ I eat.”

“There’s blessings ye say beforehand, too. I ain’t dumb.” Mrs. Jacobs crossed her arms. By then, the two oldest girls had finished dishing and took their seats at the table. “Let’s pray, bairns.”

“We oughta wait for Jonny, Mam,” Les said.

Mrs. Jacobs looked at an old clock on the wall. “Sarah and me gotta leave for work in forty-minutes, Lessie. We ain’t got time to wait.”

Crutchie snatched off his cap and folded his hands just like the Jacobs did. Jack followed suit. He and Crutchie exchanged a quick look before staring at their hands resolutely. They rarely—(never)—prayed.

“Bless us our Lord and these thy gifts which we are about to receive from thy bounty. Through Christ our Lord. Amen,” all the Jacobs except Mr. Jacobs said quickly before they dug in. Crutchie put his cap back on and began to eat.

The potatoes were so good and they were _hot_. The very taste was enough to make him want to cry. And the bread, oh, the _bread_ —

Crutchie glanced over at Jack. Though not religious, his best friend ate the food in a reverent manner. He was scarfing it down, but he still somehow managed to savor every bite. As soon as the two newsies finished, Sarah was back on her feet, cutting them up some bread. Crutchie ate his slice in two bites, and Sarah handed them another. Crutchie thought he saw Mr. and Mrs. Jacobs exchange fond smiles. Surely _he_ wasn’t the reason they were smiling, right?

Just then, there was a loud rap on the door. Lou got up and opened the door. “John’s back,” she chirped.

“Jonny!” the baby yelled.

Jonny Jacobs stepped inside the small flat. Crutchie saw a boy—a man, really—with dark curls, obsidian eyes, and well-muscled arms beneath his sweat-soaked shirt. His sleeves were rolled up. His resemblance to Henryk was almost uncanny.

It was Henryk who asked, “Why are you back so late, Jonny?”

“Got paid an extra dime if I stayed an hour and a half later. A ship came in late because of some storm,” Jonny grunted. “’Scuse me, I’m gonna go change.”

“I’ll dish your food.” Sarah got to her feet.

When he returned, Jonny took a seat next to Davey on one of the benches. He tore into the bowl of food Sarah set before him. When he finished, he looked up at Jack and said, “Hello again.” He grinned at Crutchie. “Who’re you?”

“That’s Alec, he’s Davey and Les and Jack’s pal! He’s a newsie,” Ellie told him matter-of-factly.

“But folks call him Crutchie, too,” Susan added. She pointed to the crutch leaning against the wall. Jonny only spared it a cursory glance, which made Crutchie like him instantly.

“That so? Which one you like better?” Jonny asked. He reached across the table to shake Crutchie’s hand.

“Crutchie works,” he said amicably. “You’re John, I take it?”

Davey’s older brother shrugged. “John, Jonny, whatever floats your boat. How’d you get the misfortune of meetin’ my brothers?”

“Through Jack. I’m doubly cursed,” Crutchie said. Jonny’s eyes widened for a second, and Crutchie thought he had gone too far, but then the older boy burst out laughing.

* * *

 

Jack and Crutchie stumbled into the lodging house just before the church bells struck ten. Kloppmann looked up from his ledger, spectacles balanced on the end of his nose. “Were you two out drinking?” he asked.

As they each handed him a nickel—to pay for that night’s stay--, they shook their heads. “Went over to this kid’s place for dinner,” Jack explained. “He and his kid brother started sellin’ last week; they’re nice fellas. They’re called Davey and Les.”

“They feed you well?” Kloppmann asked.

“Anythin’ is better than your cookin’,” Jack said sweetly. He dodged skillfully when Kloppmann chucked a book at him.

“Food was real good,” Crutchie added. “Soup, bread, and potatoes.”

“Ain’t we the hoi polloi?” a sneering voice drawled. Jack whirled around, ready to soak the sneering mug, but he only saw a skinny kid with blond curls spilling out of his cap. A cigar dangled out of his mouth.

“Aw, shut it, Racetrack,” he said with an exaggerated eye roll.

“Off to bed, all of you,” Kloppmann said. “I have to finish balancing the books.”

Racetrack frowned. “It ain’t _that_ hard to add nickels,” he pointed out.  

“You couldn’t even read until you was ten, Race,” Crutchie snorted.

“I remember you was only a year younger when you learned, Morris,” Race countered.

“Bed!” Kloppmann insisted again. Sighing, Jack herded the two younger boys into the chaos that was the Lower Manhattan Newsboy Lodging House bunkroom. Nearly five dozen boys played cards, wrestled, yelled, and stole from each other. They were a rough and dirty lot, but Jack knew they all secretly had hearts of gold.

When he walked in and clapped his hands once, someone whispered, “Jackie-boy’s back!” A minute later, the bunkroom had fallen completely silent.

Jack collapsed onto his bed. “Youse all better be in bed before eleven, or else I’m sendin’ the Delancey brothers after youse,” he yelled before promptly falling asleep.


	2. Chapter 2

Just four brief days later, on a Saturday morning, Davey and Les approached Jack and Crutchie again. “Wanna come over for dinner?” Les asked, shouldering his bag of papes.

“Is it the usual—potatoes and soup?” Jack grinned. This would be his third dinner at the Jacobs house; he was practically an expert by now, Crutchie figured.

“You bet,” Davey said with a quick smile. It quickly disappeared, though. Crutchie sometimes worried about the older boy; he always looked so stressed. When he thought no one was looking, the corners of Davey’s mouth would pull down and his brown eyes took on this hopeless, world-weary look. Even when he cried his headlines, he seemed distinctly unhappy.

Les, however, had an undying and often infectious enthusiasm for life. “Mam’s gonna be makin’ next week’s bread all day today, so it’s gonna smell _so_ good when we get home. It’ll be fresh an’ it’ll smell real good, _and_ it won’t hard or nothin’!”

Crutchie saw a few boys who lived at the lodging house shoot the Jacobs brothers envious looks. None of them had ever had a home to come back to at all—albeit an overcrowded and not-to-code tenement—, much less a loving mother who baked fresh bread.

Crutchie used to, but that had been a different life, practically. But, maybe, just for tonight, he could pretend that life wasn’t gone.

So he shoved his crutch under his arm, clapped Les on the back, and said, “Absolutely. I’ll meet youse here ‘round sixish?”

“Sounds like a plan.” Jack, Davey, and Les said their final goodbyes to Crutchie before Jack walked the two brothers to their new selling spot. He wanted to try them out on a new street-corner in the Jewish part of town. The brothers spoke Yiddish, an ability Jack insisted would help them sell papes.

Crutchie, shaking his head, limped his way to a street in Lower Manhattan populated largely by German immigrant families. He spent his early childhood here, before Mutti—

Crutchie shook his head. Dwelling on the past only made it worse. He assumed his position on the street corner and began to cry his lines. The crisp March air kept him awake and made his leg hurt a bit, but the sun breaking through the clouds heralded the promise of a sweet spring. Crutchie longed for the summer nights spent on the roof of the lodging house with Jack, looking up at the stars and talking about Santa Fe.

His fake headline for the day enticed customers and his papers sold quite steadily. Around noon, he had sold nineteen. When he sold his twentieth, he felt someone tap on his shoulder and he nearabout jumped ten feet into the air. He twisted his head around and saw Racetrack Higgins leaning against the wall, a cigar dangling from the corner of his mouth.

“What’re ya doin’ here?” Crutchie said, angry he let himself get spooked by Race. He’d never hear the end of this.

Race held up his bag, which somehow seemed empty. Crutchie grabbed it; sure enough, it was empty. His jaw dropped. He handed the bag back to Race.

“Careful, Crutch, you might catch flies,” Race said with a snicker. Crutchie rolled his eyes and yelled out the ~~fake~~ exaggerated headline. After a man who reeked of factory smoke bought a pape, he turned back to Race.

“Explain,” he ordered before resuming crying the headlines. While he worked, Race began his story—

“So you sees, I was sellin’ in Sheepshead, like I does every day. But this day, it’s my lucky day, Crutchie boy. I got my fifty papes in my bag, peddlin’ my papes an’ watchin’ a race out of the corner of my eye, when this drunk fella, he says, ‘Bettin’ on any of them horses?’ I says, ‘Bet you my cigar the piebald comes in second, an’ that chestnut comes in first.’” He paused when Crutchie handed a newspaper and accepted a penny from an old lady.

“So he says, ‘I’ll buy all your newspapers, kid, if the piebald comes in first an’ that chestnut in second.’ I says, ‘Deal,’ an’ we shakes hands. I’s couldn’t believe my luck. The damn piebald comes in second an’ the chestnut’s in first! Bam, fifty cents in my pocket an’ I’m done sellin’ for the day. Can youse believe my luck, Crutch?”

“I’s can’t,” Crutchie replied dutifully. He knew Race wanted to bask in his glory. He was going to be insufferable, and tell the story a hundred more times to anyone willing to listen, each time more exaggerated and glorified than the last. “You gonna get more papes?”

“Hell no.” Race snorted. “I ain’t had a free Saturday since the twelfth of Never. I’m going back to the races after I go tell some more of the fellas about it. Wanna join me?”

Crutchie almost said yes, before he remembered dinner at the Jacobs’. “Sorry, can’t. Les an’ Davey invited me to dinner.”

Race groaned. “I hardly get to see youse anymore—“

“Ya slept in my bed last night wi’ me ‘cause ya saw _one_ flea on your mattress—“

“I ain’t sleepin’ in no flea-infested bed! I’s got _standards_ —“

“Oh, really? ‘Cause two weeks past, ya ate a worm when Kid Blink betcha a penny that youse wouldn’t—“

“A’cos I ain’t ever gonna say no to an opportunity to make some dough!” Their argument was paused when Crutchie yelled out the headline again. He sold three papes in quick succession.

“We’ll hang out tomorrow night, after we’s sell the mornin’ addition. Sound good? Jack, too,” Crutchie promised.

“Dinner at Jacobi’s?” Race’s face lit up. “I pickpocketed a dime off some mug earlier, I’s got the dough.”

Crutchie did the math. If he slept on the roof tonight and seeing as he wasn’t paying for dinner, he would have enough money for the meat stew he loved at Jacobi’s. “I’s got it, too. Sounds good to me.”

“Great!” Race took off at a run, whooping, and Crutchie turned away, wishing just a little bit for the ability to run alongside his friend.

* * *

 

By six, Crutchie had sold all his papes. He leaned against the gates that led into Newsie Square, trying to keep the weight off his leg for a bit, when Oscar and Morris Delancey strode past him. They stopped, and Crutchie groaned silently.

“Hey _Crutchie_ ,” Morris said, making Crutchie despise the nickname he usually loved. It was Jack’s name for him, the newsies’ name for him, _not_ a name he wanted to come out of a Delancey’s mouth—especially in that sneering tone. He said nothing.

“Cat got your tongue, crip?” Oscar sneered, looking even more smug than usual, if that was even possible.

“Real original, Oscar,” Crutchie bit out. “Ain’t like you said that one a thousand times. Though, I s’pose it’s com-mend-a-bull”—he said that big word real slow; Davey taught it to him a few days ago—“that you was able to come up with any jibe at all. Y’know, ‘cause of your thick head an’ all. Guess it’s hard to figure out ways to tor-ment”—another Davey word—“folks when you ain’t got a brain.” He clapped a couple times.

“You lil’ bastard—“ Oscar seized Crutchie by the collar of his shirt and pulled him close. Crutchie lost his hold on his crutch, and it clattered to the ground. He struggled to support his weight on his good leg. Crutchie wrinkled his nose at the older boy’s foul breath. Oscar drew his fist back. “I’ll teach you to—“

“What’s goin’ on here, fellas?” As always, Jack arrived at just the right time. Davey stood beside him, and Les peeked out from behind Jack’s legs. Davey had a firm grip on his little brother’s shoulder.

Jack continued, “I thought I told you morons not to mess with him no more. Guess you wasn’t listenin’ the first time, Ozzy.”

“He says I ain’t got a brain,” Oscar said, shaking Crutchie.

“That’s a’cos it’s a fact,” Jack said. “Now release him, or I’ll be back with a dozen lads faster’n your Uncle Weasel can drink a bottle of whiskey.”

Oscar shoved Crutchie, who fell right on his behind. “Yer gimpy ain’t worth my time, anyways, Jackie boy,” he said. All five of them knew he was backing down from a fight. The Delanceys were just cowards at heart.

As the two slinked away, Jack pulled Crutchie onto his feet and handed him his crutch. “You al’ight?”

“Yeah, I’m al’ight,” Crutchie assured him. “Don’t think I catched a case of the stupid.”

“I would advise against prolonged exposure all the same. The Delancey strain of the stupid is particularly nasty and long-lasting,” Davey said.

“I just unnerstood ‘bout half of what you said, Dr. Davey, but I think I better listen to you,” Crutchie chuckled.

* * *

 

When they reached the Jacobs’ building, Crutchie made it halfway up the four flights of narrow stairs before he needed to take a short rest. He gritted his teeth and forced himself to climb the rest. Les, Davey, and Jack did not comment on it, but Jack clapped Crutchie on the back as they headed down the hall.

Les pounded on the door. “It’s us!” he yelled.

Crutchie heard several variations of “Shaddup, kid!” from at least four different flats on the floor, including the Jacobs’. Essie opened the door and glared at her twin.

“D’you gotta be so _loud_ all the time?” she groused. She brightened when she saw Crutchie and Jack. “Youse brought your friends back! C’mon in boys, it’s almost time for dinner.”

The four boys shuffled in, greeted by utter chaos as usual. Alannah kneaded bread dough on the tiny, cracked counter, her apron covered in flour. Ellie and Susan were stacking loaves in the bread cupboard. Crutchie’s mouth watered. Sarah was soothing a crying Sammy, walking back and forth with the baby cradled against her. Lottie mimicked her big sister, holding her rag doll just like a baby.

“Hullo, laddies,” Mrs. Jacobs said. “Sarah, would ye mind addin’ some more water an’ anudder potato to the soup?”

Sarah simply handed the crying baby to Davey, who expertly held him. He began to hum a song in what sounded like Yiddish. Lottie toddled over and began humming to her ragdolls. When her eyes landed on Crutchie, they got as big as saucers. She ran over to him and wrapped her arms around his good leg.

“Crutchie, you’re back!” she said delightedly. Crutchie grinned real big.

“That I am, Miss Lottie.” With one arm, he picked her up around the waist and then headed over to the bench at the dinner table. She squealed, more from delight than terror. He deposited her on the bench beside him. Jack and Les joined them.

“Les, Jack, you two stack the bowls for when Sarah dishes the food,” Mrs. Jacobs ordered. Les showed Jack where the bowls were. The Jacobs had exactly fifteen bowls. Les crouched down to grab them out of the cabinet. Counting carefully, he would hand a bowl to Jack, who would add it to the growing stack on the counter. When the stack got too big, he made a second stack, and then a third. Finally, they had counted out fourteen bowls. Les slammed the cabinet shut, and his mother scolded him for slamming it shut.

Crutchie felt useless, so he asked, “Is there anythin’ you needs me to do, Missus Jacobs?”

Mrs. Jacobs looked up from her kneading. She smiled at Crutchie. “You are a sweet lad, Alec. Please go check on my husband. Harry—Mr. Jacobs—could use the company. David, you go with him.”

“Mam, I’ve got Samuel—“ her son said.

“Give him to Sarah—“

“I’m going to fetch water,” Sarah said, grabbing two buckets shoved in a corner.

“Eleanor,” Mrs. Jacobs said, “can ye take the wee lad from David?”

“Yes, Mam,” the small girl said. She took the crying baby and sat with him on the floor. Lottie went to go play with them. She even gave Sammy her ragdoll.

Davey led Crutchie into one of the two bedrooms. He did not even bother to knock on the door. Crutchie figured the large family, crammed into three tiny rooms, did not even bother creating an illusion of privacy. Henryk Jacobs sat in his bed, whittling a small piece of wood. His leg was still splinted, but the bruises on his face were mostly healed. Crutchie hoped the man would get better and be back to work soon. His kids seemed to be running themselves ragged to fill his shoes. The oldest Jacobs kid, Jonny, wasn’t even back from his job at the docks yet and it was almost seven at night.

Mr. Jacobs glanced up when he heard Davey and Crutchie enter. “Welcome back, Alec! How was work, boys?” he asked.

Davey said “ _Feh!_ ” with such vehemence that Crutchie gave him a startled look.

“What’s that mean? That Yiddish?” he asked.

“It is. He’s basically sayin’ it was pretty awful,” Mr. Jacobs explained. Crutchie laughed.

“Les and I started out in this new street today. The people there are stingy. I practically have to shove my papes in people’s faces to get ‘em to buy ‘em.”

“Don’t tell your ma, she’ll say you was bein’ rude,” Mr. Jacobs said. Davey hummed in agreement. Jacobs turned his attention back to Crutchie. “What about your day, Alec?”

“Business was steady today. Sold all my papes. ‘Cept this one fella, my pal Racetrack, he got this drunk fella to buy _all fifty of his papes_. Comes to my sellin’ spot, just to tell me, all smug-like. I was real jealous, but I ain’t gonna say nothin’.”

“There’s going to be no living with him for weeks,” Davey groaned. 

“Then these two scabs who work for _The World_ , they gives me a hard time while I was waitin’ for Jack an’ Davey an’ Les, an’ I ain’t ever done nothin’ to ‘em,” Crutchie adds.

“ _Kadokhes_ ,” Davey explained. “Two of the rottenest fellows I’ve ever met, Pop.”

Henryk was about to reply when Crutchie heard Mrs. Jacobs screech, “John Kelly Jacobs, _WHAT HAPPENED T’ YER FACE?”_

Henryk groaned. “Go see what that’s about,” he said.

Davey and Crutchie crept forward and opened the door. Jonny was getting lectured by Mrs. Jacobs. One of his eyes was blackened, and there was dried blood around his nose. His knuckles were starting to bruise.

“Seems like Jonny skunked some mug, Mr. Jacobs,” Crutchie reported.

Alannah Jacobs was going on a full-on rant. “A son of mine, brawlin’ in the streets like some thug who don’t know a devil from an angel. Ye’ve got a lotta nerve, laddie, comin’ innere wi’ blood on yer face!” She started yelling in Irish.

“Ooh, I ain’t gonna miss this. My girl’s got herself all worked up,” Henryk said. He motioned to Davey, who came to help his father stand up. Crutchie leaned against the doorframe and offered his crutch to Davey, who smiled broadly at him. Henryk took the crutch and limped forward. The three of them stood in the doorway and watched the spectacle unfold.

As it was in most families, Crutchie figured (he didn’t have much experience with it, himself), Jonny’s younger siblings seem to take delight in watching him get into trouble—all except baby Sammy, who cried at the sound of his mam yelling. Ellie took him and Lottie onto the fire escape (Mam escape?) to escape the drama. The rest of them watched with pure glee as their seventeen-year-old brother was scolded like a child. Davey and Henryk were biting their lips to keep from laughing. Alannah probably yelled often enough that her outbursts had become amusing rather than terrifying. Crutchie grinned crookedly.

Jack didn’t seem to catch onto the others’ amusement. His green eyes were wide with fear, and he kept watching Alannah’s hands as she gestured wildly to emphasize her point. Crutchie wanted to reassure his friend, tell him that there was nothing to worry about. He knew Jack was waiting for one of those hands to reach out and hit Jonny, as he’d been taught to suspect as a child. Surely he knew in a family as happy and close as this, such a thing would never happen. However, judging by the terrified look in his eyes, Jack Kelly did not know that.

Finally, when Alannah took a deep breath to continue her tirade, Jonny said, “Some fella said some rude things to me, Mam. I had to sock him.”

“Ye need to turn the other cheek!” his mother countered.

“After work, this mug says he wasn’t sure if he should call me Jacobs the Jew, or John the mick. He told me I could take my pick,” Jonny said bitterly. At this, his mother’s eyes widened and Crutchie thought they moistened a bit. “I says, ‘you can either take that back, or I skunk you. Take your pick.’ He says nothin’, so I hit him with a right hook and he punches back.”

“Didya win, son?” Henryk limped a few cautious steps forward, unused to the crutch.

“’Course I did, Pop,” Jonny said with a wide grin. “You taught me to give a mean right hook.” He kissed his bruised knuckles. Alannah swatted him on the shoulder half-heartedly.

“I should be mad,” she said.

“The boy was defendin’ his honor, Alannah,” Henryk said in his low rumble. He kissed her on the cheek, gently, in a way Crutchie had never seen a man kiss a woman. “Sometimes you have to fight, my darling.”

Alannah shook her head. “Let’s get ye cleaned up, John. My lad,” she sighed. “Dun make this a habit, you hear me?”

She took water from a basin on the windowsill and a rag. She began to scrub Jonny’s face gently. Once in a while, her callused fingers would caress his cheek, or smooth a stray black curl.

Leaning against the doorway, watching the mother and son, Crutchie felt he was intruding. Like he was watching a game from the sidelines, wanting to join in but not knowing how to play. What did he know about being a son, or having a mother who tended to his injuries after a fistfight? All he had was Jack, who’d call off the bullies if he could and fight them with Crutchie if he couldn’t.

A brother wasn’t the same thing as a mother.

And watching Mrs. Jacobs and Jonny play the “mother and son” game, he wished desperately that he could, too.

* * *

 

Oscar Delancey got back at Crutchie a week later. That morning, the Jacobs brothers invited Jack and Crutchie to dinner for a fourth time. Crutchie was insanely excited. He desperately hoped that Saturday night dinners at the Jacobs’ flat would become a routine. Davey’s family was really nice. He adored Davey’s little sister Lottie, and found Henryk’s dry sense of humor hilarious.

Last week, Alannah _doted_ on Jack and Crutchie. She gave them extra bread and potatoes. She almost fell out of her chair when she found out Jack knew Irish. Crutchie and Henryk stared blankly at each other while the Jacobs kids, Alannah, and Jack chattered in Irish for a solid hour. After dinner, she mended a tear she had noticed in Crutchie’s shirt. He washed his hair, arms, face, and torso with water _and_ soap in the basin on the windowsill. He felt clean for the first time in a couple weeks. Jack took advantage of the opportunity, too; it was weird seeing his best friend without a grimy face. Kloppmann charged three cents a hot bath, so they did not bathe that often.

As he waited alone on Newspaper Row, waiting for Jack and the Jacobs brothers, Crutchie let himself get pumped up for the dinner. He could not wait to tell Lottie about his week and tell Mr. Jacobs that he had put word out on the street that he was looking for a cheap crutch—

That’s when someone kicked his bum leg from behind. Crutchie yelled out in pain and fell face forward on the cobblestones. He narrowly missed a pile of horse manure. He heard a familiar snicker and _knew_.

“Piss off, Oscar, you _Hosenscheisser_!” Crutchie spat. He flipped onto back and sat up. He picked up his crutch and tried to get to his feet, but Oscar snatched it away.

“You ain’t so brave without Cowboy Kelly to protect ya. Little Crutchie ain’t got his babysitter to wipe his snot an’ hold his hand,” Oscar taunted. He threw the crutch behind him.

Crutchie had to admit that stung. “Listen here, asswipe—“

Oscar responded to that with a kick in the ribs. Crutchie swore like a sailor. He saw stars when Oscar landed another one. He grabbed Crutchie by the shirt collar and landed a punch to his face. He backhanded him and shoved him back on the ground.

Oscar took a step back and grinned at his handiwork. Crutchie’s nose was dripping blood and an awful bruise was starting to bloom on his left cheekbone. He clutched his ribs and his bum leg was practically trembling. “That’ll teach you not to humiliate me in the future, eh, Morris? I ain’t gonna let some cripple try an’ show me up.” He kicked Crutchie’s crutch further down the street and walked away with his thumbs hooked in his trouser pockets and whistling.

Crutchie let himself wallow in his misery and pain for sixty seconds. That’s how many seconds Jack said were in a minute. At least, he thought Jack said so. He couldn’t remember; his head was pounding. Finally, he set about trying to find his crutch. Finally, he saw it lying in the gutter, next to a pile of garbage. Oscar had managed to kick it halfway down the block.

Crutchie stretched his legs tentatively and had to bite back a moan. He would have to crawl to get to his crutch. The street was filthy, filled with garbage and manure. He felt hot tears of shame prick in his eyes.

Thankfully, not many people were around. It had been six-thirty the last he’d seen, and that was a good while ago. Newspaper Row shut down around five. Crutchie began his slow crawl to his crutch, swearing in a mixture of German, English, and Italian (thanks Race) under his breath. After a couple minutes (he had to pause often, his ribs hurt like hell), he heard someone say from behind him, “Do you need help?”

Crutchie twisted around to see a girl in a real nice dress and hat staring down at him. She looked about Jack’s age. Her hair was up in one of those fancy up-dos, all curled and pinned up. She was clean, too. She certainly didn’t wash her two shirts and one pair of trousers in a washbasin once a month. This girl looked like she took a nice, steamy bath every single night. Despite looking so rich and clean, a pencil was tucked behind her ear and her hands were stained with ink. She looked down at him in concern and horror.

“No, miss, thank you, I’m okay, it ain’t a big deal—“

“What happened to your face?” she asked quietly.

Crutchie found himself rambling. “I made one of the fellas who guards the circulation gates real mad, so he found me after I’s finished sellin’ for the day. He threw my crutch down the street so I’m tryin’ to get to it—“

“Your crutch?”

“Yes, miss, I needs it to walk, I’s got a bad leg,” Crutchie said to the ground.

The girl pointed in the direction he’d been crawling in. “Is that it?”

“Yes, miss.” Crutchie called her ‘miss’ out of habit. Even though she was probably only a few years older than him, it was safer for gutter rats like him to always be respectful to rich people.

She went walking down the street. To Crutchie’s utter amazement, she picked it up and hurried back over to him. “Here you go,” she said primly.

“I, uh, thank you, miss!” Crutchie took the crutch and got to his feet shakily. He leaned on it heavily.

“Do you need help getting home?” the rich girl asked. _Dang,_ Crutchie thought, _she’s really nice._

“No, miss, my, uh, my _brother_ and our pals are meetin’ me here after they finish sellin’. They’ll see me back home safe,” Crutchie said. He didn’t want this nice rich girl seeing where he lived. She’d probably faint if she saw the lodging house. Besides, it was sort of nice pretending that he had a real brother (Jack was his brother, just not by blood) and a family waiting for him to come back after a long day of selling.

“If you’re sure. Have a nice night, Mr…?”

“Alec Morris,” Crutchie said, using his given name.

“I’m Katherine Plumber.” When she offered her hand, Crutchie shook it. He hoped he did not get dirt on her hand. Before she left, she paused. “Mr. Morris, are you a newsie?”

Crutchie grinned crookedly. “You bet I am. I work for _The World_.”

She chuckled. “I’m the competition, then. I’m a reporter for _The Sun_.”

“We’s don’t really care what paper we sell for, as long as the headlines are decent. Though the way ol’ Joe writes his headlines, youse’d think he _didn’t_ want his paper to sell. You wouldn’t believe the crap my buddies and me come up with to get folks to buy our papes. We oughta write the headlines ourselves.” Crutchie rolled his eyes.

The girl turned stony-faced. “I suppose you must get the paper to sell. Well, good night, Mr. Morris.” She turned around and walked away.

Crutchie wondered what made her get so cold all the sudden. They’d been having a nice conversation. “Bye, Miss Plumber!” he called after her.

About ten minutes later, Jack and the Jacobs arrived. Jack swore when he saw Crutchie. Davey covered Les’s ears and shook his head. “Let’s get you home, Crutch,” he said.

“I still want to go to your place,” Crutchie said.

“Sorry, I meant my place,” Davey amended. “Let’s get you back. You don’t look so good. My mam can patch you up, she doesn’t work Saturday nights.”

“Oscar do this?” Jack said grimly. When Crutchie nodded miserably, the older newsie growled, “I’m gonna _kill_ him.”

“I’ll help,” Les said. “What a bastard.”

Davey glared at him, and Les ducked his head to hide a grin.

* * *

 

They managed to get Crutchie back to the Jacobs’ flat. Alannah freaked out when she saw Crutchie’s bruised and bloodied face. Jack and Davey helped him to the bedroom Davey shared with some of his siblings. Crutchie was settled on Davey and Jonny’s bed while Alannah and Sarah puttered around the tiny kitchen looking for medical supplies. Jonny hovered in the doorway anxiously, and the little kids were wailing and saying that Crutchie was going to die. Henryk demanded that Davey help him into the other bedroom so that he could “see the damage the bastard did himself”.

“I’ll kill him,” Henryk muttered.

Jack looked at him with a big grin. “I said that, too!”

Jonny cracked his knuckles. “Let’s do it,” he said darkly.

Fourteen people ended up huddled in the tiny, dark bedroom while Alannah tended to Crutchie’s injuries. Dinner sat forgotten on the table. They washed the blood off his face and put warm rags on his aching ribs. Alannah poked at them gently and said, “I dun think they’re broken, just bruised. Yer a lucky lad, Alec.”

Sarah appeared with a bowl full of onion soup and potatoes. “Eat,” she ordered. Crutchie tucked in happily. She herded her family and Jack into the kitchen to go eat dinner. “I’ll sit with him,” she said.    

After they had all left, she folded his filthy, bloodied shirt and undershirt and pursed her lips. “I’ll wash this in the morning before mass. You can borrow Davey’s spare night shirt tonight.”

Crutchie immediately began to protest. “I got a spare undershirt at the lodging house, I can just—“

“The _lodging house_? You ain’t goin’ back there tonight. You’re staying right here,” Sarah said.

“I can’t just take Jonny an’ Dave’s bed—“

“John an’ Jack can sleep on the floor, an’ David can sleep in the bed. Problem solved.” Sarah rolled her eyes. “Ain’t no use in complainin’ about it, Alec.”

“Yeah, I knows.”

“Quit your gripin’ an’ finish your food.” Sarah grabbed Crutchie’s long-sleeved undershirt and inspected it for tears. When she saw a hole the size of her fist on the back, she got up to go get the family sewing kit and her mam’s scrap bag. She found a scrap of gray fabric that matched the undershirt well enough and got to work. When she was done, Crutchie could barely believe his eyes. It looked like the shirt had never been torn.

“Yer a proper seamstress,” he said in admiration. She offered him a tiny grin.

She replaced two missing buttons on his shirt (they did not match the other buttons, but he did not care) and patched a tear in the elbow. She had to patch it with burlap, the only fabric that came close to matching his got-washed-about-four-times-a-year-white shirt.

Once she saw to his shirts, she found Davey’s spare night shirt in a small chest at the foot of the bed and handed it to Crutchie. She turned around while he changed. She took his trousers and got to work. She took in his trouser cuffs so he didn’t have to roll them anymore. She patched the holes he’d worn through with his knees and fixed the hole in one of his pockets.

“How’d you learn to sew like that?” Crutchie asked once she added the folded trousers to the pile of Crutchie’s newly mended clothes.

“Mam. She comes from a large family—seven kids—, an’ they always had to wear hand-me-downs. She was always sewing their clothes back together. Now imagine in a family of twelve with the dad outta work. We ain’t got the coin to spare on clothes. I honestly don’t think Lottie has anything that ain’t gone through at least one sister. All six of my little sisters have worn the coat an’ shoes _I_ wore when I was real little.” Sarah paused. “Besides that, Mam says bein’ able to sew is just somethin’ all women got to be able to know. When sheets get too worn, you can tear ‘em up an’ make pillowcases. Sewin’ quilts saves you money an’ gives your kids somethin’ to hold on to when you’re dead.”

“My ma sewed all the time. She was a dressmaker back in Germany, an’ she did it over here, too,” Crutchie said without thinking. His eyes widened. That was the first time he had mentioned her out loud in over a year.

“Were her dresses pretty?” Sarah asked gently.

“Real pretty. She couldn’t afford fabric to make dresses the upper-class folks would want, but the middle class ladies—doctors’ an’ lawyers’ wives—flocked to her shop. The money was decent,” Crutchie said. It was nice telling Sarah about Mutti, he realized. It hurt, but not as much as it used to.

“D’you mind…. D’you mind if I asks what happened to her?”

This was why Crutchie never told anyone about her except for Jack. They always asked this question. But he had made his choice, and Sarah deserved to hear the end of Mutti’s story.

He shrugged. “She died of typhoid. I think I was seven.”

“I’m very sorry to hear that.”

“Yeah, me too.” Crutchie glanced up. “Means a lot, Little Dave. It does.”

Sarah stared at him for a second. “Did you just call me _Little Dave_?” she repeated.

He grinned. “Yep, Little Dave. There a problem?”

“’Course there’s a problem! David’s eleven months older than me, an’ he ain’t _that_ much taller than I am.”

“Why’s Sarah havin’ a fit, Crutchie?” Jonny yelled from the kitchen.

“I called her ‘Little Dave’,” the newsie yelled back.

A roar of laughter came from the other room.

“I’m goin’ to _kill you_ ,” Sarah hissed.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Sir, there’s an angry pregnant woman asking for you at the front gate. What do I tell her?”
> 
> Warden Snyder looked up at his guard again. “What?”
> 
> “Sir, there’s an angry pregnant woman—“
> 
> “I heard you the first time, Thierfelder. What does she want?”
> 
> “I dunno, sir, something ‘bout her son—“

By the time the strike happened, Jack and Crutchie went over to the Jacobs’ house for dinner one to three times a week. They were there when Alannah announced she was four months pregnant in April, and when Jonny presented his dad with a crutch he bought after working extra shifts for three months in May. Crutchie took Lottie to sell with him once or twice a week, and he treated her to a pastrami sandwich at Jacobi’s on her birthday. Every Saturday night, Crutchie slept over the Jacobs’ house. He even went to mass with them a couple times. Jack refused to stay over, though. He insisted there wasn’t enough room. Crutchie knew it was something more than that, but his best friend never talked about it and Crutchie never managed to get it out of him.

One night in June, he sat up until midnight on the roof waiting for Jack to come back. When his best friend finally did, Crutchie saw the terror on his face.

“What’s wrong, Jackie?” he whispered. Jack sank down next to him on the pile of blankets they’d taken from the lodging house.

“Snyder saw me with Les an’ Davey after work. Chased us halfway across ‘Hattan, he did. Got us all into Miz Medda’s theater a’fore anythin’ happened, though. It was too close for me, though.” Jack was breathing really heavily.

“You tell ‘em what it was about?”

“’Course I did! They ain’t stupid. I says that he runs a jail for kids, an’ City pays him for every kid he gets. Davey says that’s awful, an’ I agree. I says I got arrested for vagrancy the one time an’ stealin’ food the rest of the times. Les asked what vagrancy was, an’ then Miz Medda found us. She let us watch her show.” He grinned. “Davey saw my paintings, too. Said I’m real good.”

“A’cos you are,” Crutchie said. “How was the show?”

“Good.” Jack yawned. “I’m tired, Crutch. I’s gonna sleep.”

“Sure you don’t wanna talk ‘bout the Spider?” Crutchie whispered.

“I don’t ask you ‘bout yer mudda an’ you don’t ask me ‘bout the Refuge. That’s the deal, Crutch,” Jack said harshly before laying down. Crutchie looked away to hide his hurt expression. Finally, he laid down next to Jack and fell into an uneasy sleep.

 

* * *

 

_When Jack hears Crutchie got taken to the Refuge from Specs, all he can think about is how he never apologized to his best friend for snapping at him on the roof that one night._

_He goes to the Refuge with Specs that night, and his best friend cannot even hobble to the barred window to talk to him. Jack is grateful the dark hides the tears in his eyes._

_After that depressing visit, he drops Specs off at the lodging house and storms over to Medda’s. She just hands him a paint brush and a few cans of paint. She wraps her arms around him, like his mother used to before she died. “Go let it out, baby, go let it out,” she tells him._

_So he paints, and lets it out._

_He’s still painting when Davey, Les, and that irritating reporter find him. They argue and argue, but then Davey tells Jack his plan about the city-wide newsie rally. The kid’s smart, Jack will give him that. Still…_

_“I can’t, Dave. I ain’t puttin’ them kids in danger.”_

_“Lighten up, no one died.”_

_Jack wheels around to face Davey. “That’s what yer goin’ for? No one dying?” He tells Davey about Crutchie and is barely able to keep his tears in. “Do you even care about Crutchie?”_

_Jack staggers back a step when Davey’s fist connects with his jaw. He stands there, shocked, as mild-mannered, gentle Davey snarls, “God damn you, Jack! You aren’t the only person in the world who cares about Crutchie.”_

_Jack’s muttering a quiet apology when Katherine speaks over him. “Quitting doesn’t do Crutchie any good,” she says. Jack looks at her and sighs inwardly. Deep down, he knows this beautiful girl is telling him the truth, but—_

_Snyder’s beating Crutchie with his own crutch. “Jack! Jack!” his best friend screams as the Delanceys drag him away—_

_“Jack, even if it seems like we don’t care, we …” Les pauses. “My mam is takin’ care of Crutchie.”_

_Jack blinks. “Whaddaya mean?” he demands._

* * *

 

If Alannah Jacobs were to face her Maker this very moment, she knew she could at least tell Him that she was a good mother.

She’d bore eleven children (ten still lived) and loved them with every fiber of her being. She nursed them when they were sick, kissed their cuts and scrapes, and held their hands when things got scary. She worked nights to provide for them and watched her littlest ones during the day while the older ones worked. She never laid a hand on them, but she was firm with them and made sure she raised them right.

At age seventeen, she married the man she knew was her other half. Henryk and Alannah worked at the same factory and they met during a lunch break. After six months of courting in secret—Alannah’s father beat her when he found out Henryk was Jewish—, her friend’s brother who was a priest married them quietly. Henryk rented a small room above a tavern, and in those next eight years she gave birth to eight children in that room. In that room her second child, the one between John and David, died at age five of cholera. Her name was Máire—a girl with her mother’s smile and her father’s eyes.

Nothing had ever hurt her that much and nothing could ever hurt her more. Losing her darling Máire shattered her heart.  A year after she died, Alannah gave birth to twins. God had given her an extra baby to replace the one she lost, everyone at her parish told her. It sure didn’t feel like it, though.

(Esther Máire Jacobs was a huge comfort to her mother in those dark times, though).

But when David told her that her Crutchie had been taken to that horrible prison Jack had mentioned a few times, Alannah felt her heart shatter again.

She _loved_ that boy. He had taught Henryk to walk with a crutch and given her husband a sense of purpose again. He played games with her little ones and his special bond with Lottie made her cry sometimes. After he told her about his mother, she hugged him tightly and murmured soothing words to him in Irish. She did it for the woman who could never hug him like that again.

When her heart shattered, Alannah knew that this motherless boy had found a mother again.

And by God, Alannah Jacobs was a good mother and she would _not_ let her son rot in a jail cell. 

* * *

 

To get Crutchie out of the Refuge, she had to go to another jail first.

She got back from work, ate a light breakfast, and slept for three hours. She put three newspaper-wrapped potatoes and half a loaf of bread in her pocket. Sarah stood in the kitchen, Lottie clinging to her skirt and Sammy in her arms. Les stood behind her, his arm in a homemade sling. He’d been beaten badly by one of the strikebreakers. Alannah could barely look at her young son’s bruised face. His usually-bright brown eyes were dulled with defeat.

(Davey had gone to work; they desperately needed the money, and the strike seemed hopeless. Rent was due in a couple weeks.)

“Go get Alec, Mam,” Sarah said.

Alannah kissed Sarah, Les, Lottie, and Sammy on the forehead. “I will,” she promised.

It took her several hours to walk to the prison on Blackwell Island and to get across the bridge. Gosh, she wished the trolley workers weren’t on strike. She got through prison security easily enough—although they did raise their eyebrows at all the food tucked in her pockets.

“For the inmate I’m visitin’, sir,” she explained.

“Who might that be?” the prison guard asked.

“Francis Sullivan.”

“You his wife, sweetheart? ‘Cause if you are, Sully will kill you. He’s been in here long enough that that baby ain’t his.” He gestured to Alannah’s swollen stomach.

“His wife is almost seven years dead. I’m her sister. My name’s Alannah Kelly.” Alannah used her maiden name.

The guard wrote down her name on a list and beckoned her to come in the room. “Take a seat at the far table, we’ll bring Sullivan out in a bit.”

It was nice to rest her aching legs. Alannah squinted in the gloom. It was a Wednesday morning and everyone was at work, so she was the only visitor there. All the rickety tables were empty. A single filthy window let in a bit of dim sunlight. The gray stone walls were slick with moisture, the ceiling mildewed, and the air smelled of rot.

Ten minutes later, a guard brought in a haggard man wearing a striped prison jumpsuit. His hands were shackled in front of him, and his hair was closely-cropped to prevent lice. His beard was thick and unkempt. His green eyes were sunken, but they still sparked with an intelligent light. He scowled when he saw her.

 _Oh Frankie,_ Alannah wondered, _what happened to the lad my sister fell in love with?_

“You have thirty minutes,” the guard told them. He leaned against the wall, whistling softly.

“What are ye doin’ ‘ere, Alannah?” Frankie asked immediately.

Alannah pulled a potato from her pocket. She slowly peeled away the newspaper she’d wrapped around it. “If ye answer my questions, I’ll give ye this potato,” she said.

“Ye always did get down t’ business, I’ll give ye tha’,” Frankie chuckled. “What, no hug for your favorite brother-in-law?”

“Forgive me if I dun hug the man who got arrested an’ made my sister die of a broken heart.”

“So, wha’ baby is this? Las’ I remember ye had eight or nine.”

“Eleventh. I’ll have him in about a month,” she told him curtly.

“Got any grandbairns? John or Máire get married yet? Dave’s too young for a wife, I think—“

“Máire’s dead,” Alannah said shortly. “Never lived to see her sixth birthday. Ye know that, Frankie. Ye ain’t gotta be cruel.”

Frankie looked stricken for a moment. His hard gaze softened. “I forgot, Alannah. Honest. Swear t’ God.”

“Dun swear,” Alannah said sharply.

“Ye always were a good Catholic, too.” Frankie hesitated. “Have… Have ye heard from Frank Jr.? Is tha’ why you’re here?”

“I wish it was, Frankie, I do. Not in years, no one has. He was gone when we found Cliona’s body.”

“They were me _a chuisle mo chroí_. Both of ‘em,” Francis said shakily. “They’re prob’ly both dead, now.”

“I would have taken him in as my own, Frankie. I loved Cliona. She was more a daughter to me than a sister.”

“Ye raised her, alright. Your mam was about as nurturin’ as a snake. You was wha’, ten years older than her?”

Alannah nodded. “ _That isn’t what I came here to talk about, Francis. I’m here about the Whyos.”_

Francis bristled. “ _My Irish ain’t as good as it used to be, Alannah. Why ye talkin’ Irish?_ ”

“ _So the guard dun overhear us.”_

Francis nodded. “ _Fine. Wha’ d’you need t’ know?”_

_“Don’t a few of the bigwigs in the Whyos owe ye a few favors, from back when ye an’ my da ran with ‘em? Back when we all lived in Fourth Ward?”_

_“Yeah, they do. Some of my cousins an’ nephews, they’re still Whyos. They owed yer da a few favors, too. I bet they’d let Ros Kelly’s oldest lass call in those favors. Oh God, Alannah, what did ye get yerself into?”_

_“I need ye to call in my da’s favors. I need ‘em to rough up a prison warden. His name’s Snyder.”_

_“Snyder the Spider? Why do ye wanna rough ‘im up? He’s a dangerous fella.”_

_“There’s this lad my sons have befriended, an orphan. They threw him in Snyder’s prison on shabby charges. I want to get him out.”_

_“All this for some street rat that yer lads are pals with?_ ” Frankie scoffed.

She looked him dead in the eye. “ _He’s practically my son, Frankie.”_

He let out a heavy sigh. “ _There’s a few Whyos in here. I’ll talk to ‘em. They’ll get word to the bosses. How bad d’ye want him roughed up?”_

_“Bad enough that he won’t be walkin’ on his own, but no permanent damage. They can’t kill him, either. I want it done in a couple days’ time.”_

Frankie eyed her. “ _Ye’d’ve been a good Whyo, Alannah. Ye’re ruthless.”_

Alannah stood up and handed him the potato. “ _No, Frankie, I’m not ruthless. I’m just a mother who wants her son back_.”

“Bye, Alannah,” Frankie said. “Think ye’ll ever be back ‘ere?”

She wanted to tell him no, but she paused. Father McNally said they had to comfort the imprisoned. “Maybe around Christmastime. Or if I hear any word about Frank Junior.” With that, she left the prison behind her.

 

* * *

 

“Sir, there’s an angry pregnant woman asking for you at the front gate. What do I tell her?”

Warden Snyder looked up at his guard again. “ _What_?”

“Sir, there’s an angry pregnant woman—“

“I heard you the first time, Thierfelder. What does she want?”

“I dunno, sir, something ‘bout her son—“

“None of these kids have parents!” Snyder growled. “Or at least parents who’d go looking for them. Who the hell is her son?”

“I dunno, sir.” Thierfelder winced. “She’s Irish, sir, and mighty angry. You know how those Irish women are.”

Snyder sighed. “Send her in.”

* * *

Alannah marched past the nervous-looking guard and burst into the dingy office on the first floor of this miserable building. Alannah, who had spent her life living in a series of dilapidated tenement buildings, found the Refuge to be the most rancid and disgusting place she had ever stepped foot in. And she used to live in the one of the most notorious slums in _Dublin_.

“Are ye Warden Snyder?” she growled.

“It says so on the door.”

“I can’t read, sir, so I must make sure,” Alannah sat down in an empty chair. “I’m seven months pregnant,” she explained. “I tire easily.”

“Is that so?” Snyder said. 

“I’ll be blunt, Warden,” Alannah began. “My name is Alannah Morris. When I heard my son had been arrested, I almost went to the police. Then I realized—ye _are_ the police.” She looked around the office and wrinkled her nose.

Snyder sneered at that. This woman in a worn maternity gown had the gall to look disgusted at _him_? Her son was the gutter rat that had ended up here.

“Who is your son?”

“Hans-Alexander Morris,” she said.

“ _Who_?” Snyder would remember if they brought a kid with such an awful name in.

“Some of his friends call him Crutchie. I call him Alec.”

“Oh, yeah, I know him. He’s a cripple, right?”

She stared at him with blazing blue eyes. “He’s been wrongfully arrested, is what he is.”

“Alannah, your brat was arrested for disturbing the peace, damaging his employer’s property, and assaulting an officer of the peace—“

“Mrs. Morris.”

“Pardon me?”

“Ye will address me as Mrs. Morris, not my Christian name. We ain’t on familiar terms here, Warden.” Alannah somehow managed to daintily roll her eyes. “Now, several eyewitness accounts have ye in fact beating my son with his own crutch when he pleaded for ye to stop. He was striking for fair wages, not ‘disturbing the peace.’”

“ _Mrs_. _Morris._ ” Snyder paused for effect. “I would almost bet money on the fact that your ‘eyewitnesses’ are newsies who are also wanted for damaging Mr. Pulitzer’s property. Quite honestly, there isn’t a cop in the city that will listen to you. Your boy will serve his eight month sentence. You should be grateful it isn’t longer. Now, one of the guards will escort you out—“

“Perhaps I wasn’t clear enough, Warden.” Alannah’s tone was dangerous. “My maiden name is Kelly.”

“Is that supposed to mean something?”

“You’ve taken note of my accent, too?”

“Yeah, I get it, you’re a Fenian. What is your point?”

Alannah tried to ignore the slur. “I grew up in the Fourth Ward. My father was fresh off the boat and had a slew of children to feed. He needed to find someplace to work. I believe ye’ve heard of the Irish Mob? He was a Whyo.”

Snyder went still. Alannah smiled wolfishly. “Da’s been in the ground for years now, God rest his soul, but Mob rules say that a mobster’s kid can call in his favors if he’s dead. An’ unless ye want to hear a man calling ‘Why-oh, why-oh,’ while he’s lookin’ to do bad things to ye, I’d let my son go.”

“Are you threatening me, Mrs. Morris?”

Alannah tilted her head and considered it for a moment. “I suppose I am, Warden. Oh, an’ one more thing—ye’ll have to pay for a doctor to see to him. I’ll give ye my address.”

Snyder sputtered, “That’s ridiculous, he doesn’t need a doctor—“

“My eyewitnesses say otherwise. I’ll be waiting outside.” Alannah told him her address and Snyder wrote it down with shaking hands. Before she left, she told him, “This empire of yours has been built on sin and suffering. One day ye will pay for your crimes, Snyder.”

She slammed the door shut behind her.

* * *

 Twenty minutes later, the front gate to the Refuge opened. Out limped Crutchie in handcuffs. His trousers were filthy and torn, and he wore a shredded gray undershirt. A guard was half-dragging him along. “Get your hands off him!” Alannah shouted.

The guard let him go. He unlocked Crutchie’s handcuffs, and shoved him towards Alannah. “Here’s your brat, bitch.”

Crutchie spat on the guard’s shoes and Alannah hid a grin. The gate slammed shut behind the guard. He slid the lock into place and disappeared within the depths of the building. Crutchie turned to Alannah and practically threw himself at her. She wrapped her arms around him gently, holding him tight. She let him cry it all out. She murmured soothing words to him in a mixture of English and Irish, stroking his greasy blond hair.

“I don’t think I can walk home, Mrs. Jacobs, I can barely stand up,” Crutchie muttered.

Alannah smoothed his hair down. “Dun worry, laddie. I took care of that. They should be here any minute—“

Just then, a cart pulled by two black horses stopped in front of the Refuge. Jonny and the cart driver waved to them. Crutchie’s eyes widened.

“We’re here to take youse home, Crutch. C’mon, get in,” Jonny said. His eyes got real wide when he saw how bruised and battered Crutchie was.

“Ye’ll have to help him in, John,” Alannah said.

In no time, they were all settled in the cart and Jonny was directing the cart driver back to their tenement building. Alannah gave him the food she had put in her pockets and he tore into it hungrily.

“How’d youse get a _cart and horses_?” Crutchie whispered.

Jonny grinned. “Y’know how I’s unloads stuff at the docks? Well, Paddy Murphy here delivers the stuff I unloads. Snyder caught him a few times, an’ Paddy was more than happy to help bring you home safe.”

“He’s a bastard,” Murphy said.

“Amen to that.” Crutchie nodded.

“We’ll get a doctor to see to ye, Alec,” Alannah told him.

“That’s too expensive, I ain’t got the money for a doctor. Neither do youse!”

Alannah smirked. “Snyder does.” 

* * *

 

An uptown doctor ended up coming to the Jacobs’ apartment. He knocked tentatively at the door. “Is this where Hans-Alexander Morris lives?” he asked quietly when Sarah yanked the door open. He straightened his tie nervously as he peered around the dingy room and the large amount of small children staring back at him.

“It is. What took youse so long?” Sarah muttered something to herself in Yiddish. “It don’t matter. Go to that back bedroom, that’s where he is. He’s all bunged up.”

The uptown doctor cautiously went into the back room, where Crutchie was laid out on Davey and Jonny’s bed. Alannah and Henryk hovered nervously. Davey, Les, Race, Specs, and Kid Blink all sat on the floor. Jack sat at the foot of the bed, just watching Crutchie sleep.

 “I’m Dr. Davis Barlow,” the doctor said. He stared down at Crutchie in horror. The sleeping boy’s shirt had been removed. Red welts littered his stomach, ribs, and back. He had a black eye and a crooked leg. Two of his fingers were purple and swollen.

“This is Alec,” Henryk said.

“How did this happen?”

“He was in the House of Refuge. They beat ‘em pretty bad there. The juvenile jail. He didn’t do nothin’, though,” Jack said angrily.

Barlow looked to Alannah and Henryk. He gestured around the room. “Are all these boys yours?” He looked pointedly at Alannah’s heavily pregnant stomach. The immigrants in the slums always bred like rabbits.

“A few are, yeah. The rest are Alec’s friends,” Alannah said.

“I need the friends to leave. I need space to work. It’s too… crowded in here.”

Kid Blink stood up when the others started to protest. “Race, Specs, let’s go back to the lodging house. Let the man do his job. We’ll come by in the mornin’.”

They clasped hands with Jack and Crutchie, and they were gone.

“You all can clear out, too,” Barlow said to Alannah, Henryk, Davey, Jack, and Les.

“Ain’t no way I’m leavin’,” Jack said firmly.

“Jack stays. The rest of us can leave,” Henryk said. When Davey and Les started to protest, he glared at them. They skittered into the main room. Alannah and Henry left more slowly. Jack offered Alannah a tense smile before the door was slammed shut.

Alannah blinked when she saw Race, Specs, and Kid Blink sitting on the floor, playing with Lottie and Susan.

“We couldn’t brings ourselves to leave, Missus Jacobs. Youse mind if we stays?” Race mumbled.

“’Course not,” Davey said. “’Sides, we got a strike to plan. Let’s go on the fire escape.”

“I’m comin’,” Sarah and Les said in unison. The seven of them disappeared onto the fire escape, and the room felt a lot less cramped.

John stood up. “I’ll get the little ‘uns to bed, Mam. Sammy’s already asleep. Lottie, Susan, Eleanor, Ess, let’s get settled down for the night.”

“Les ain’t gotta go to bed,” Essie muttered.

“Unless the flower sellers of Lower Manhattan are suddenly on strike, Esther Máire Jacobs, you can get to bed,” Henryk said sternly.

“Yes, Pop,” Essie muttered, letting John herd her and her little sisters to bed. She would probably have to sleep on the floor. Sammy, Lottie, Susan, and Eleanor all shared a narrow bed.

Lou grinned at her parents from her seat at the dinner table. “ _I escaped the culling_ ,” she said with a smug little grin in Yiddish.

“ _So did four of your other siblings,_ bubbala.” Henryk let out a low chuckle.

“ _Speak English_ ,” Alannah said. It was one of the few Yiddish phrases she knew.

Lou laughed. “ _How am I supposed to practice then, Mam?_ ” she said in Irish.

Henryk frowned at her. Alannah swatted his arm. “How do you think _I_ feel, Harry?” she demanded.

Lou stood up and shook out her skirts. “You two should get to bed. Dad’s applyin’ for jobs tomorrow an’ Mam, you have to get up early for work.” Alannah had swapped her shift at the factory with another woman until the end of the week. She’d wanted to be at home at night, in case something happened with the strike. Next Monday, she would resume the night shift.

Henryk was leaning heavily on his crutch. “Dang, Alannah, I think our daughter just ordered us to bed.” He let out a big yawn. “And I think she’s _right_.”

Alannah swatted his shoulder again. “We’re off to bed, I guess. Louise, can you stay up until Dr. Barlow is gone?”

“That his name?”

“Yeah.”

“Sure, no problem. Now off to bed!” Lou said with faked sternness. 

* * *

 

Louise was asleep with her head on the table when the doctor strode out of the back bedroom. It was so hot inside; the strike planners on the fire escape had just decided to sleep out there. The apartment was already brimming with people.

She awoke when she heard the doctor tiptoeing across the creaky floorboards. “How’s Crutchie?” she asked.

“Crutchie?” he said.

“Alec. The kid you just treated,” Lou said.

“His ribs are cracked so I wrapped those in bandages. I treated the belt marks on his back and splinted his two broken fingers.” Barlow hesitated for a moment. “Your brother, the hurt one, and the man—he’s your father, yes?” Lou realized Barlow thought Crutchie was her sibling. She didn’t mind the thought of that, honestly.

“Yes.”

“Your brother says he has a limp because of polio. Did your father have polio, too?”

Lou thought it was terribly rude of him to ask, but she shrugged. “He got hit by a truck four months ago. It shattered his leg. Our doc thinks he’ll always have a limp.”

“This doctor, what is his name?”

“Dr. Liam McKinley. He’s an Irishman.” Lou paused. “I don’t think he treats uptown folks.”

Barlow dug into his pocket and handed her a business card. “This has my address on it. Once things settle down here… Or is it always like this?”

“Like what, sir?”

“Loud. Crowded. Noisy.”

“There’s twelve of us livin’ here in these three rooms, Dr. Barlow, and a baby on the way. It never really settles down. Once the strike is over, though, it’ll be less crazy.”

“The strike?”

“The newsboys’ strike. They jacked up the price of papes, so they’re all strikin’. That’s how Crutch—um, Alec—got arrested. Two of my other brothers are newsies, too.”

“Well, once the strike ends, send one of your brothers down to this address. I want to take a look at your father’s leg and see what I can do.”

Lou hesitated. “We ain’t got the money for that, sir.”

“Free of charge.”

Lou still looked suspicious, but she thanked the doctor and saw him out. Before she shut the door, she asked, “Do you do births, too?”

“Yes, I do.”

“My mam, sir, this is her twelfth baby. She’s thirty-six; not exactly in her prime, y’know. She’s been havin’ babies since she was eighteen. I sometimes worry she’s not gonna make it through her pregnancies.”

“When was the last baby born?”

“My brother Samuel will be two soon,” Lou said.

“Send one of your brothers my way when your mother goes into labor,” Barlow said. “Goodnight, Miss…?”

“Louise Jacobs,” she said. “Night, Dr. Barlow.”

He walked out the door, shutting it softly behind him. Lou washed the dishes. She took off her dress and draped it over a chair; she would just sleep in a shift. She wrapped herself in a threadbare blanket, and fell asleep on the floor.

* * *

 

Everyone was jolted awake the next morning by someone pounding on the door. Lou, her long hair mussed from sleep and clad in just a shift, yanked her dress over her head and opened the door. She left the chain on and peered through the crack. A rich-looking girl, wearing a real nice dress and hair done up in curls and _everything_ , was standing at their door. A _rich person_ was at their door.

“May I help you, miss?” Lou said, trying to sound polite.

“Is this the Jacobs residence?”

“Yes, it is—“

“I need to speak to Jack and Davey right now.” The girl practically bounced up and down. She clutched a newspaper in her hand.

Lou undid the chain and opens the door. “Come on in, miss. Give me one minute.”

Mam poked her head out her bedroom door, squinting in the dawn light. She had Sammy on her hip. Even the Jacobs, as poor as they were, did not wake up this early. “ _Who’s this, Louise?”_ she asked in Irish.

“ _Says she knows Davey,_ ” Lou responded. Mam spared the girl one last glance, shrugged, and went back to bed. She’d had a long night.

Lou went to the window to go wake the newsboys and Sarah up. Annoyingly enough, the rich girl stayed right at Lou’s heels. Lou yanked the window open.

“David,” she said. “ _David_.”

All of them—Davey, Les, Jack, Specs, Kid Blink, Racetrack, and Sarah—started to stir. Davey sat up, rubbing his eyes blearily. He was shirtless, wearing just his trousers. She tried not to notice how she could count his ribs. When had they all gotten so _skinny_? “What, Lou?” he mumbled.

“ _Some rich girl is here to see you and Jack. She’s wearin’ these pearl earrings, and they looks_ real _,”_ Lou said in Yiddish. “ _How’d the likes of youse get to know someone who’s the likes of_ her _?_ ”

“ _Don’t speak Yiddish, Lou, it makes them uncomfortable because they do understand us_ ,” Davey replied. “ _Her name’s Katherine Plumber, she’s a reporter who is interested in the strike.”_ He turned to the boys and Sarah, who were all rubbing sleep out of their eyes and changing out of their sleepwear. “Katherine’s here. We can all go to the roof.”

Katherine leaned out the opened window. “How do I get to the roof?”

Sarah eyed her warily as she tied her apron over her factory dress. “The fire escape, of course.”

“ _Don’t be rude, Sarah_ ,” Davey snapped.

“ _What happened to no Yiddish_?” Lou snorted.

“Why did God give me _six_ sisters?” Davey growled. He started climbing the fire escape ladder to get to the roof.

“I ain’t ever seen him this worked up before,” Jack said in awe.

“I didn’t think Davey _could_ get mad,” Race whispered.

Lou and Sarah high-fived through the window. “It’s a special talent we have,” Sarah told the newsies with a wide grin. “If youse will excuse me, I gotta go get breakfast started. Tell me what happens on the roof. She climbed through the window. She even helped Katherine climb through the window in an attempt to make nice with the reporter.

“Go get water so I can make gruel,” Sarah told Lou. Her younger sister saluted and grabbed a bucket. She ran out the front door.

“She ain’t even wearing her shoes,” Sarah grumbled fondly under her breath.

* * *

 

The Manhattan newsies stared at Katherine expectantly. Their bruised faces were resigned and tired.

“Look at all these glum mugs.” She shook her head. “I can’t believe these are the same guys who made the front page of _The New York Sun_!” She held the paper up excitedly. “‘Newsies Stop _The World_!’’’

“Now there’s a headline even Jack couldn’t make up!” Blink snatched the paper and dodged Jack’s fist in one fluid motion. “There we is!” he crowed triumphantly.

“Where’s me?” Race said. “We’re famous, ain’t we?”

“Of course we is, a’cos we stopped _The World,_ ” Jack said. He turned to Katherine. “You show this to the other fellas yet?”

“No, just you five,” Katherine said.

Jack turned to Kid Blink and Specs. “You two, stop by the lodgin’ house an’ round up all the fellas. Tell ‘em to go to Jacobi’s at nine, say I got big news. Me an’ Dave will get Crutchie there.”

“Crutchie’s in jail.” Katherine frowned.

David grinned. “Oh, he was. My mam got him out.”

“ _What_?” Katherine stared at him.

“She knows some fellas in the Whyos who could put pressure in the right places. She grew up in Fourth Ward. Even Snyder’s scared of the Irish Mob.”

“Your _mother_ is in the Irish Mob?”

“Not Mam, no—my granddad and my uncle were.”   

“Oh.” Katherine relaxed a bit. “How is he?”

“They beat him pretty bad,” Jack growled. “Doctor came an’ saw to him last night. Mrs. Jacobs made Snyder pay for Crutch’s doctorin’, too.” He smirked.

“Hey, Jackie. What do you wants me to do?” Race piped up.

“I need ya to escort Miss Plumber around town, wherever she needs to go.”

Katherine scowled. “I do not need a babysitter, Jack Kelly.”

“Naw, but Race does.” Jack caught Race’s wrist when the boy tried to sock him in the gut. “It ain’t proper for a girl like you to be walkin’ around this part of town alone.”

“You sound like my father,” Katherine retorted. “I can take care of myself.”

“You wanna get pickpocketed or dragged down a dark alley? This ain’t a good part of town. You ain’t stupid, Plumber. Take Race with you. Just the smell of him scares thugs away.”

“I’m gonna kill you in your sleep,” Race grumbled. He halfheartedly tried to sock Jack with his free hand. Jack caught that wrist, too. 

“I have nowhere to be, anyway,” Katherine said. “I’ll stay here.”

Davey yawned. “Can we go back to bed, then?”

* * *

 

Katherine found herself standing in the kitchen awkwardly with two of Davey’s little sisters. She did not realize that Davey and Les were not the only Jacobs kids. Lou read the newspaper while Sarah prepared a thin gruel for breakfast.

“That’s mostly water,” Lou said with a wrinkled nose.

“I added it so it could feed everyone. It’s crowded in here, even for us,” Sarah said.

Lou rolled her eyes and turned her attention back to the newspaper. “I’m going to hang this on the wall,” she announced. She pulled a thumbtack out of the wall and pinned the newspaper between the framed map of Ireland and the icon of St. Patrick above the mantle. Katherine peered at the mantle curiously. It was cluttered with tiny metal saint statues, a wedding photo of Davey’s parents (Mrs. Jacobs looked not a day over eighteen in the photo), and the family Bible and what appeared to be a Torah. Katherine found a _yahrzeit_ candle and got extremely excited. Her father was Jewish—nonpracticing, sure, but Katherine still knew a lot about Judaism.

“Are you guys Jewish?” she asked Sarah.

“Pop is. Mam’s Catholic, though, and Pop insisted we all get baptized Catholic. He always says it would’ve broke her heart if we weren’t,” Sarah said, her face unreadable. “David and I have really Jewish names, though, so people always think we are.”

“My dad’s Jewish, too, but he converted to Anglicanism when he married my mother,” Katherine said. She stood up. “What’s a good bakery around here?”

“There’s a good one a block over. It’s called Hirsch’s Bakery. Pop gets us cinnamon rolls from there every Christmas,” Sarah said. “Why do you ask?”

Katherine turned to Lou. “I’m going to get some cinnamon rolls. Lou, can you show me the way?”

 

* * *

 

Crutchie woke up to the smell of cinnamon rolls. Once, Jack stole one for him on his birthday, and the taste of it made him cry. He inhaled deeply, almost positive he was dreaming. But as he peeled his eyes open, he saw Katherine sitting at the foot of his bed holding a cinnamon roll.

“You up, Crutchie?” she said.

“Yeah, I am.” Crutchie groaned as he sat up.

“Are you okay?” Katherine sounded concerned.

“Cracked ribs,” he explained. He eyed the cinnamon roll, and Katherine handed it to him. He tore into it hungrily, mumbling his thanks.

“Crutchie.” She spoke softly. “Do you remember, about four months ago, when a girl handed you your crutch after you had gotten…beaten up?”

“Yeah,” Crutchie mumbled. “That was you. I recognized you the moment you walked into Jacobi’s. I never told no one, though. The fellas wouldn’t believe it. A rich goil helping a newsie crip out? Jack would probably think I was smokin’ opium or somethin’.” He looked at her. “Though, you’re helpin’ all of us out right now, so mebbe it wouldn’t’ve been so hard to believe.”

Katherine handed him a newspaper. His eyes widened when he read the title. “Front page, eh?”

“We’re going to have a city-wide newsie rally at Medda’s theater tonight. Jack and Davey want you to speak there. In an hour, they’re going to tell everyone the plan at Jacobi’s. Do you want to go?”

Crutchie shook his head. “Not really. I ain’t feelin’ up to it.”

Katherine stood up. “Okay. I’m going to head out. All the Jacobs are at work. Davey, Les, and Jack are at Jacobi’s. A neighbor is watching the two little ones. Are you okay being home alone for a few hours?”

He forced a smile. “I don’t mind. I can sleep some more.”

“Would you like another cinnamon roll before I go? I got two dozen for breakfast this morning, so there’s some left over.”

Crutchie gaped at her. “Yes, please,” he said eagerly. She went into the kitchen and brought back another delicious pastry. He ate this one more slowly. Katherine said her goodbyes and headed out.

Crutchie was pretty sure he imagined it, but he thought he heard Katherine and Race squabbling in the hallway.

 

* * *

 

Crutchie spoke at the rally after Spot Conlon. For some reason, they could not find Jack or Katherine and had to go on without them. (Crutchie hoped they weren’t off smooching somewhere. He had seen the way they danced around each other). It was intimidating, speaking after Spot. The King of Brooklyn was a bit shorter than he’d thought, but he still seemed pretty terrifying with those biceps. Crutchie shouted some jumbo about workers needing to defend themselves against greedy snakes like Pulitzer and how they needed to stand together to win this strike. Davey chimed in, saying it was time Pulitzer started treating them like adults—

“Youse wanna be treated like an adult? Start actin’ like one,” Jack said. Davey greeted him with enthusiasm, but his face dropped when Jack continued on. “Now fellas, listen here. This is what’s gonna happen. We’ll dig our feet in the sand and refuse to sell papes. Eventually, Pulitzer will put the price back to where it was.” Cheers sounded out. Jack held up a hand, and they died down immediately.

“A couple weeks later, he’ll raise the price again. And again, and again. We can’t keep striking forever. Most of us barely make ends meet as it is. Pulitzer can tighten his belt and dig his feet in the sand way longer than we can, fellas. This strike ain’t gonna work. It was doomed from the start.” He was met with a shocked silence. Crutchie could not believe what he was hearing.

“I spoke with Mr. Pulitzer this afternoon _personally_. He will write up a contract promising not to raise prices again for at least two years. I say we take the deal—“

The newsies found their voices again. “I don’t think you’re Cowboy Kelly,” Spot yelled. “I think you’re Coward Kelly!”

Race waved his clenched fist at Jack. “You ain’t no better than a _Delancey_ , you lousy scab,” he growled. “To think we was ever friends.”

Crutchie and Davey just stared. Les’s face was filled with pure horror. Jack was his _hero_.

Jack did the one thing he never did—he turned and fled. Davey and Crutchie exchanged a quick look and hurried after their friend. He was fast, but they followed him out the back entrance that opened out into an alleyway. A guard Crutchie recognized from the Refuge was handing him a big wad of cash.

“You goddamn sellout!” Crutchie roared, limping forward. The guard glanced his way and hurried out of the alley. Crutchie shoved at Jack’s chest, angry tears welling in his eyes. “How _could_ you? Snyder broke my fucking ribs and whipped me with a leather belt! He snapped two of my fingers without _blinking_! **FUCK YOU**!” He lashed out wildly with his crutch, his ribs aching. He struck Jack on the leg, the shin, in the chest, over and over and over. Jack just stood there and took it. Davey finally pulled Crutchie away.

Davey held Crutchie when the boy burst into sobs. He said nothing, but his dark eyes were full of silent judgement.

“You’re my _brother_ , Jack,” Crutchie said miserably. “You know how awful the Refuge is. You _know_ what he did to me. How could you betray us like that? I never asked for much from you. I sold my papes and bought my own food and worked twice as hard as everyone else. Maybe not as hard as you, but I _tried_.”

“Crutch—“ Jack began, taking a step forward.

Crutchie cut him off. “Don’t come near me. Go to Santa Fe, for all I care. I’m going home.” He headed out of the alley. Davey followed him.

“Back to the lodging house?” Jack asked.

Crutchie turned around and glared at him. “No, to Davey’s. Where my _real_ family is.”

 

* * *

 

J _ack flees to his rooftop. No one checks for him there. He paces and paces, until he hears a tiny voice say, “Jack?”_

_Jack whips around. It’s Katherine, her hair a wild tangle of curls. He doesn’t want to, but all he can see is traces of Pulitzer in her beautiful features._

_“What are you doing here?” Jack rasps._

_“Because you gave up! You let them down,” Katherine says furiously._

_“You betrayed us! You’re one of them, you dirty liar,” Jack retorts._

_“I never lied! I told you Katherine Plumber was the name I wrote under; you never thought to ask me my real one. I wrote the news article I promised you. What have you done besides kill the revolution you started?”_

_Jack turns away from her, because everything she just said is painfully true and he doesn’t want her to see the shame in his eyes._

_“Can I ask why you did it?”_

_“You remember. Snyder threatened to throw all the newsies at the rally tonight in jail. He threatened Davey an’ Les an’ Crutchie an’ even Mrs. Jacobs.”_

_“It was more than that. Something about Blackwell Prison?”_

_Jack closes his eyes and remembers…_

**_Snyder leans really close to him. Jack can barely focus, his heart is beating so fast. This man has hounded him for years, tortured him, beaten him. He’s in every one of Jack’s nightmares. And Katherine, Pulitzer’s daughter, just sits there crying softly._ **

**_“I have influence in other prison institutions—my buddy works as a guard in Blackwell Prison. I can easily make life worse for a certain inmate. Perhaps even lengthen his term?” Snyder chuckles._ **

_“I told you I was an orphan, yeah?”_

_Katherine hesitates. “No, but I figured.”_

_“People always ask if I got folks. I tell ‘em I ain’t got no folks nowhere. I even told Crutchie that,” Jack says shakily. “That ain’t quite true.”_

_“What do you mean?”_

_“My ma was the most beautiful woman I ever saw. She had blonde hair, freckles, and a charming Irish accent. Her name was Cliona Kelly. She got real sick when I was around Les’s age. Died in just a few hours.” Jack lets out a heavy breath. “My da, he was complicated. He’d beat the shit out of me when I pissed him off, but he’d take me to the Brooklyn Bridge or Central Park on his days off. He told me stories about the Wild West and how he wanted to see Santa Fe one day. He drew me pictures of Ireland—that’s where he and Ma were from. He taught me to speak Irish and how to throw a punch.”_

_Katherine reaches out and touches his arm. “What happened to him, Jack?”_

_Jack meets her gaze, finally. “Even if he didn’t always treat me good, Da loved Ma. You could tell by the way he looked at her. Ma loved him, too, even if she cried when he beat me or when he came home with blood on his hands. He was in the Irish Mob. That’s what got him thrown into prison. Ten years on Blackwell Island._

_“I think that’s what killed Ma. Her love for him. Last thing she told me was, ‘You tell your da I love him, Francis.’”_

_“Francis?” Katherine cocked her head._

_“Da’s name is Francis John Sullivan. Ma named me Francis John Sullivan, Jr. After she died, I just took all our money and left the apartment. I kept walking until I ended up in an alley. Some newsie poked me awake the next morning and asked me what my name was and what I was doing sleeping in an alley. I says without thinking, ‘My name’s Jack Kelly and I’m headed for Santa Fe.’_

_“He says, ‘Sure, Cowboy.’ That kid was Racetrack. I let Francis Sullivan, Jr., die in that alley. But sometimes I think about Frank Senior. I kinda miss him. He’s a piece of shit, sure, but he’s still my da an’ he’s rottin’ in prison. It ain’t right.”_

_“You did it because Snyder threatened your father,” Katherine realizes. She takes a step forward and puts a hand on his shoulder. “Oh, Jack…”_

_He shrugs her off. “I dug my grave, now I got to lie in it. Youse better go, Katherine. There ain’t a strike anymore.”_

_Katherine scowls. “The strike’s alive and well, Jack, even if you won’t participate in it. I saw the hope on those boys’ faces. And I have an idea.”_

_He snorts. “You got an idea?”_

_“You aren’t the only one with ideas, Jack Kelly,” she says angrily. She reaches into her messenger bag and pulls out a rolled-up piece of paper. “I found this at the Jacobs’ apartment. Is this the Refuge?” She holds up a sketch of a wretched boy chained to a wall. Rats gnaw at a plate of food just out of the boy’s reach. “Is…is that you?”_

_He snatches at it. “Give it here! It ain’t none of your business.”_

_“I wrote an article… It calls for a city-wide strike. The Children’s Crusade. It calls for all the workers under twenty-one to not show up for work. We can print a paper! With my article and a couple of these drawings, we can expose Snyder and—“_

_“Youse crazy, Pulitzer! Insane. No kid’s gonna miss work. This is the newsies’ fight, it ain’t the factory kids’ or the bootblacks’ or the flower girls’—“_

_“When you got those scabs to throw down their papes, you referenced all kids who worked in sweatshops and slaughterhouses and factories. The strike isn’t about the newsies anymore, it’s about the working kids of New York getting what they deserve!”_

_Jack hesitates. “Ain’t a paper in town who will print that article.”_

_“I know.” Katherine chews her lip._

_“Wait—“_

_“What?”_

_“After they threw me in the basement, I found this old printin’ press shoved in the back corner…”_

_“I have a friend who knows how to work a printing press,” Katherine says excitedly. “And you know how the Governor put his support behind the trolley workers on strike?”_

_“Yeah?”_

_“What if he did it for the newsies?”_

_Jack stares at her for a long time. “Katherine Pulitzer, you just might be onto somethin’!” He cups her face with one hand and kisses her. She pulls away for a second, startled, but then she leans in and starts kissing him back._

  __

* * *

 

At the Jacobs’ apartment, everyone ate dinner in silence. Jack being a sellout had shocked the entire family. Les was glaring at his onion-and-potato soup as if it had personally wronged him. Crutchie sat on his rickety chair, rubbing his leg.

Henryk lurched to his feet, gripping his cane tightly. “I’m going to bed early tonight,” he rasped. He looked at Crutchie, Davey, and Les. “You boys goin’ to work tomorrow?”

“We got to,” Davey said sullenly. His look of tired resignation, which had disappeared during the past week, had returned.

“Sixty papes a day,” Crutchie said bitterly. “It’s going to be _rough_.”

“Ain’t even makin’ any more money,” Les spat. He threw down his spoon. “It’s—it’s not _fair._ And Jack just bailed—“ His big brown eyes were watery.

Jonny, who was sitting next to him, wrapped an arm around him. “Lessie, life ain’t fair. I didn’t find that out until I was fifteen and worked twelve long, hard hours and got seventy-five cents for all that work. I’ve been working for almost three years now, an’ I ain’t ever made a cent more. It’s good you’re learnin’ this young.”

“John!” Sarah hissed. “D’you gotta be so blunt?”

“Whaddaya want me to tell him, Sarah?” Jonny retorted. “Most of the littles ain’t babies no more, no matter how much you tries to mother ‘em. I’m his big brother, I gotta tell him how it is.”

Sarah crossed her arms. “Well, I’m his big sister an’ it’s _my_ job to protect him. And, Lester, if I could, I would march right up to Pulitzer’s office an’ punch him right in the face,” she told her little brother.

“Well you can’t,” Jonny muttered.

“Quiet, both of ye,” Alannah said angrily. “Arguing won’t solve anything _._ ” She stood up. “I will go to bed, too.” She picked up Sammy and went into her bedroom. “Lottie, Susan, Ellie, come along. It’s time for bed.”

“The big kids get to stay up,” Ellie whined.

“That is because they are big, lassie. Bed, now,” her mother said firmly. The three little ones got up, put their dishes in the sink, and filed into the tiny bedroom they shared with their parents and Sammy.

Lou got up. “I’ll go wash the dishes on the fire escape. Les, Essie, wanna help me? Les, you can dump the dirty water down below.”

Les lurched to his feet. “Really? Mam _never_ lets me do that!”

“ _What she knows won’t kill her_ ,” Lou said in Yiddish. “Come along.” She grabbed a bucket of water, a couple rags, and some soap. Les and Essie got to work moving the dishes from the sink to the fire escape.

Jonny motioned to Crutchie, Davey, and Sarah. “Let’s go to our room,” he said. They nodded and trudged into the other bedroom.

“Why we in here?” Davey asked.

“We have to figure out sleeping arrangements,” Jonny said. He gestured to the three beds. “Lou, Essie, and Les share that bed. Me an’ David share that one. Lou an’ Sarah share that one. Where’s Crutchie gonna go?”

Crutchie started. “I’m just stayin’ here until my injuries heal. Then I’m goin’ back to the lodgin’ house—“

Sarah snorted. “Yeah, right. As if Mam would ever allow that.” She paused. “Y-you know youse here to stay, right, Crutch?”

“I ain’t your bro—” Crutchie swallowed. “I don’t—“

“You think youse ain’t our brother? Bull _shit_. I just ain’t sure why we’s didn’t make it official sooner,” Jonny said. “Why d’you think Mam got you out of the Refuge? She loves youse, as much as she loves me or David or Sarah or Lottie or Susan. Pop, too. We _all_ do, Crutchie.”

Crutchie’s eyes widened. John rarely, if ever, expressed emotion. He accepted affections from his younger siblings and mother easily enough, but rarely did he initiate or express affectionate gestures. If he was saying such things, he had to really mean them.

Crutchie looked at the three oldest Jacobs siblings. He’d had a family, a long time ago, but even then it had just been Mutti and him. The newsies were a family, sure, but not in the way he and Mutti had been. The only other person who he had considered family—a brother—was Jack, at least until he betrayed them all…

Crutchie pushed that thought out of his head.

Basically, Crutchie had forgotten what a proper family was like until he met the Jacobs family. It was a family that didn’t consist of a ragged group of orphans who barely scraped by. No, this family provided stability and love and support and advice to some random cripple they barely knew. Davey’s sister mended his clothes and his mother offered him hugs and advice. Henryk was the closest thing to a father Crutchie had ever had. Crutchie had become a big brother to Lou, Les, Essie, Ellie, Susan, Lottie (God, he _adored_ Lottie), and Sammy. He had come to love Jonny and Davey as much as he loved his big brother Jack. Sarah was probably his closest friend in the world, besides Racetrack.

He had considered the Jacobs family his family for a long time, but he had never considered that they might consider him family, too.

“I’s your brother? You mean that?” Crutchie whispered.

Tears welled up in Sarah’s eyes. “Of course we do, Crutchie Morris.” Her eyes twinkled. “Or should I say Crutchie Jacobs?” She gasped when Crutchie surged forward and wrapped his skinny arms around her. She hugged him back, tightly.

“Welcome to the family, Crutchie,” Davey said.

* * *

 

Around eleven, when everyone was asleep, someone pounded on their door. Davey lurched out of bed, and Jonny got up from where he slept on the floor.

“Who’s there?”  mumbled Crutchie. He had curled up into a tight ball, and was currently trying to uncurl himself.

“Shh, go back to sleep. David an’ I got this,” Jonny murmured. He nodded to Davey, who was murmuring similar reassurances to Les, Sarah, Essie, and Lou. They opened the bedroom door and went to the front door. Hefting Crutchie’s crutch as a weapon, Jonny yanked the door open. He stepped back in shock when Katherine let out a shriek of terror.

Davey peered around Jonny to see Katherine and Jack standing in front of his doorway. “What do _you_ want?” he hissed at Jack.

Jack held up his hands in surrender. “I screwed up, Dave. I’m _sorry_. But we ain’t got time for fightin’,” he said breathlessly. “Kath an’ me, we figured out a way to save the strike.”

Jonny was ready to slam the door shut, but a quiet voice behind them said, “Let ‘em in. Let’s hear ‘em out.” Jonny and Davey whirled around to find Crutchie hovering behind them.

* * *

 

_Heart pounding, Jack looks into Crutchie’s wide brown eyes and sees **forgiveness**._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> JACK IS DAVEY'S COUSIN!!!!
> 
> lol that was my really predictable (at least to me) plot twist of this fic. 
> 
> In all seriousness, enjoy this behemoth of a chapter. I hope everyone in the US had a great Labor Day weekend. I sure did!
> 
> The Whyos were actually an Irish gang that operated in the notorious Fourth Ward, an Irish slum. They were known for their terrifying warcry of "why-oh, why-oh."


	4. Chapter 4

“I’ve got Race gettin’ Kath’s pal and bringing him to _The World_ building,” Jack finished. “We need the extra hands. Would…would youse help us?” He ducked his head, staring at his hands.

The whole Jacobs family crowded around the kitchen table. Lottie sat in Crutchie’s lap. He played with her dark curls absent-mindedly, trying to take in what Jack and Katherine were proposing. “A…a _city-wide_ strike?” was all he could manage.

“It’s bold,” Henryk said, rubbing his bad leg. He spoke softly, as he cradled a sleeping Sammy to his chest. “I’ll give youse that.”

“D’you think it could work, Harry?” Alannah murmured, lacing their fingers together. She stroked his strong, callused hands. Their casual affection for each other made Crutchie’s chest swell with emotion. He wanted something like that, someday.

Henryk looked around the room, at his almost-a-dozen children. They worked hard for paltry wages, and they never uttered a single word of complaint. They got up before dawn and returned just as the sun was setting. He wished they could go to school. He wished he could buy them new clothes instead of giving them ragged hand-me-downs. He wished they had more than one pair of shoes. Wishing had never done him any good, though.

“I started working when I was ten. _Tate_ and _Mame_ wanted me to shine shoes, so I did. I made a dime a day and didn’t see a penny of my wages until I moved out and got married. I took a job at the docks when I was twenty and worked there until I got hurt. I’m thirty-eight now. Eighteen years at that job, and what did it get me? A bum leg and no job. If a grown man can’t even protect himself, what about all you kids? How can they possibly protect themselves?” He looked at each young person in the room, from Lottie to Katherine. “Go on strike, kids. Do it for the people like me, yes, but most importantly, do it for yourselves.”

* * *

 

The next seven hours were a whirlwind. At midnight, they left the apartment and split up. Essie and Lou tracked down their fellow flower sellers to spread the news, while Les went to the lodging house to round up the newsies. Sarah began knocking on every door in their tenement building. Jonny started seeking out all of his buddies from the docks. Davey, Crutchie, Jack, and Katherine headed to _The World_ building. The poorly-paid janitor let them into the basement, and they get to work. Some fella named Darcy, whose dad apparently owned _The Tribune_ , and Bill Hearst (Crutchie felt important, hobnobbing with all these rich kids) got the printing press working. The newsies, led by Les, appeared to distribute the paper across New York City. Even Spot Conlon and his boys showed up. Crutchie looked over at Jack and offered him a tiny grin. Nervously, Jack spit in his hand and held it out. Crutchie spit into his own hand and shook Jack’s.

“ _Ich vergebe dir_ ( **I forgive you** ) _,_ ” Crutchie murmured. 

“What’s that mean?” Jack frowned.

Crutchie just smiled. “I’ve learned a lot of lessons these past few months.” He watched Les and Davey as they hoisted bundles of newspapers on their thin shoulders. “One of them is that family don’t give up on each other, no matter what. I ain’t sure why youse did what youse did—I knows youse had a good reason, I just ain’t sure what it was--, but youse my brother. Nothin’ can change that.”

Jack was about to speak when Katherine came up and pecked him on the cheek. “I’m off. Wish me luck,” she said nervously.

“You’ll convince him, Katherine,” Jack promised her. “Won’t she, Crutch?”

Crutchie grinned. “She’s like a hound with a bone. There’s no way he ain’t gonna listen to you,” he promised the reporter.

Their entire strike was depending on it.

* * *

 

 Six o’ clock in the morning found them riding around in Paddy Murphy’s wagon, sleep-deprived and handing out newspapers to any child worker they saw. Newsies stood on every street corner, passing out papers to anyone under eighteen. Lou and Essie went all over the factory district until they had a sizeable herd of preteen and teenage girls following them around.

By eight o’ clock, an estimated ten thousand child workers were assembled in front of _The World_ building. They hailed from all boroughs and all professions. The bootblacks and flower girls and factory workers and newsies stood shoulder-to-shoulder. Crutchie saw Irish kids, Polacks, Jews, Germans, Italians, African-Americans, and so many other ethnicities standing side-by-side.

He stood with Davey and the rest of his siblings. Lottie was perched on his shoulders. She kept shouting, “STRIKE! STRIKE! STRIKE!”

Sarah watched as Davey, Jack, and Spot headed inside to talk to Pulitzer. “Good luck,” she murmured.     

* * *

 

 

Crutchie whooped when Teddy Roosevelt, Joseph Pulitzer, and Jack appeared on the steps of _The World_ building. Jonny hoisted Eleanor up, and Lottie had resumed her rightful place in Crutchie’s arms. Davey was muttering a prayer under his breath—

“There must come a time when the new generation steps up and demands its place at the table,” the Governor said. He looked around at the hordes of children and sighed. “You’ve certainly done that.”

Jack stepped forward. “In other words… WE WON!”

The crowd broke into cheers. Some kids were crying, others yelling, others dancing and whooping. Some of the Irish kids started singing _Kelly the Boy From Killane_ , the song about the Irish rebel that came out the previous year. Davey and the other Jacobs kids joined in. “John Kelly was killed rebelling against the British,” Davey explained to Crutchie. “That’s who Jonny is named after.”

Crutchie grinned crookedly. If he squinted, he could see Jack as a wild Irish rebel informing his troops of victory against the Brits.

When Snyder got tossed into the prison wagon, it was pretty satisfying to snap the cuffs on his wrist. “I’ll tell my ma you said hi,” Crtuchie said before slamming the door shut. He ignored Snyder’s roar of anger.

* * *

 

Not twenty minutes later, Jack was hugging Davey and Crutchie. “I should be off to Santa Fe,” he muttered.

Crutchie scowled and hit Jack on the shin with his crutch. His brother yelped and hopped on one foot. “What the hell was that for?”

“Ain’t nothin’ for youse in Santa Fe. Your family’s _here_. Now ditch this nonsense, come back home, an’ have some dinner,” Crutchie ordered.

Jack blinked, and that was that.

* * *

 

They were all eating dinner at the Jacobs’ flat, celebrating their victory. Jack and Jonny had to sit on the floor to make room for everyone. Katherine was there, too. She was sandwiched between Les and Susan. She kept raving about how _good_ Alannah’s potatoes were.

“Pulitzer offered me a job,” Jack said quietly, when the noise had died down a bit.

Jonny laughed. “You already work for him.”

“Not as a newsie. As an illustrator,” Jack muttered.

Alannah grinned. “Jack, that’s _wonderful_! Ye are so talented; he’d be crazy not to hire ye. No offense, Kate,” she exclaimed.

“None taken, Mrs. Jacobs,” Katherine said with a laugh.

“The pay’s good. I can get my own apartment,” Jack said. “No more sleepin’ on rooftops.”

Crutchie frowned. “Why d’you look so upset, then?”

“I don’t wanna leave the fellas. I ain’t ever lived alone.” Jack’s voice cracked. “They’s the only family I got.”

“Dun get all worked up, laddie,” Alannah said sternly. “Let’s think through this logically. Ain’t no reason why ye can’t keep stayin’ in the lodgin’ house. It’s smarter, that way. Ye can save yer money an’ move out when ye turn eighteen. By then, Jonny will be lookin’ for a flatmate. Ye can move in with him. Ain’t that a solid plan?”

Jack grinned. “Missus Jacobs, you may be the smartest woman I’s ever met,” he said in an awed voice. “What’s your secret?”

Alannah looked around the room and smiled fondly. “I’m a mother, laddie, that’s my secret.”

* * *

 

After everyone else was in bed, Crutchie, Jack, and Davey sat and talked on the fire escape. They mostly gloated over their victory, retelling the tale over and over again. Finally, Crutchie asked, “Jack, we gotta know… Why’d you take the money? I wasn’t in prison no more; Snyder had nothin’ to hold against you.” He had thought about this a great deal, and he still didn’t understand.

“I’d’ve gone to the Refuge in a heartbeat,” Jack said in a rush. “But… Snyder did have something to hold against me.”

“Who? He couldn’t have gone after us or Katherine. We got Mob protection, and Joe would never let Katherine go to prison,” Davey said, confused.

“My da,” Jack said grimly.

“Your dad’s dead, Jack,” Crutchie said. “Ain’t he?” His voice wavered when he saw the look on Jack’s face. “You lied.”

“I never said he died. I just let you assume he was dead,” Jack corrected his brother. “I…My da’s not a good man. He was in the Mob, Dave, like your granddad. He got caught, and sentenced to ten years in Blackwell Prison. Ma died not long after. I ran away.” He let out a shuddering breath. “My name ain’t Jack, not really. Kelly was my ma’s maiden name, and John my middle name. My real name is—“

“Francis John Sullivan, Jr.,” Davey whispered.

Jack’s jaw dropped. “How the hell do youse know that, Dave?”

“My mam had a little sister, Cliona. I don’t remember her. We didn’t see her much, my mam was too busy with work and kids to get our families together often. My maternal grandparents were pretty awful, so Mam’s relationship with her family is strained at best. But I remember when my granddad died, Old Ros Kelly, there was a kid with green eyes and dark hair playing in the dirt outside the church. I played with him. Later, my pop said that was my cousin Frank Jr.” Davey’s brown eyes were unreadable. Crutchie’s mind was racing—what was his adoptive brother saying?

“My ma was named Cliona,” Jack whispered.

“My uncle Frankie went to jail because he was involved in the ‘family business’”—Davey made air quotes—“and my aunt died shortly after. Mam always said she died of a broken heart. My cousin went missing. The family searched and searched, but could find neither hide nor hair of him.”

“Davey—“ Crutchie began, but Davey spoke over him.

“Uncle Frankie went to Blackwell Prison. He was the one who Mam spoke to, to get Crutchie out of prison.”

Jack was crying now. Crutchie blinked—he had hardly ever seen his brother cry. He only cried when he talked about the Refuge.

“I think we’s cousins, Dave,” Jack choked out.

Davey nodded. “I think we are.”

The two boys seized each other in a tight embrace, and Crutchie knew Jack had found a family, too.

* * *

 

Aunt and nephew stood shoulder-to-shoulder, staring at the small headstone.

“It’s all we could afford,” Alannah muttered after a few minutes.

Jack’s green eyes swam with tears. “It’s beautiful, Aunt Alannah,” he said. He read the epitaph out loud. “ _Here Lies Cliona Kelly Sullivan, wife of Francis Sullivan and mother of Francis John Sullivan. Sleep on now, and take your rest*.”_

“That last part, it’s from the Gospel of Matthew. She never slept as a baby, so I thought she might appreciate it in the afterlife,” Alannah said thickly.

“How much older were you than her?” Jack wanted to know.

“Seven years. In some ways, she was practically my daughter.” Alannah reached out with a callused finger and touched the top of the gravestone.

“She never mentioned youse. She never mentioned her family at all,” Jack said. “D’you knows why?”

Alannah sighed. “Has David mentioned anythin’ about my da?” Jack shook his head. “Ros Kelly was the meanest dog skinner in Fourth Ward. He was a top lieutenant in the Whyos, an’ no ‘un dare defy him. My mam, she was _terrified_ of him. We all were, but he was awful to her. He beat her every time she got pregnant. Said he didn’t need another mouth to feed. Cliona was the fourth baby, I was the oldest. Mam wasn’t very interested in us, so I did most of the raisin’, even back in Ireland. Four brothers an’ two sisters to look out for. I had no clue what I was doin’, so I made a lot of mistakes.

“The biggest ‘un prob’ly was that I left home at seventeen to get married. I left all six kids with that _monster_ , yer mam included. I wanted to get away from the Mob, out of Fourth Ward. If I’d’ve stayed there, I’d’ve married some Whyo who beat me an’ drank too much whiskey. So I eloped with Harry an’ then had Jonny. I never looked back.”

“You was only a kid,” Jack said.

“I should’ve been there,” Alannah said. “Cliona was sixteen when she married Frankie. She was three months pregnant, I think. They was crazy in love. Frankie started hanging with the Whyos—my da convinced him it was better than pulling fourteen hour shifts at the factory. He got all my brothers mixed up in it, too. Cliona became even more withdrawn from the family. She wanted ye away from the Mob, especially your granddad. She told Frankie to leave his work at the door an’ sucked it up. The ideal Mob wife.” She sounded bitter.

“I get she kept me from Granddad an’ the rest of the family ‘cause she wanted me to stay out of the Mob. But why didn’t she tell me about youse? Youse wasn’t involved in the Mob.”

“I left her, though, Jack. An’ it was probably easier to cut off contact with all of us. For all their faults, she loved our parents. Being around me would’ve reminded her of them.”

“I thought I had nowhere to go, when she died,” Jack admitted. “I’s didn’t know where any of youse lived, or even if you’d take me in. Da was in prison, an’ she was dead. So I sold all the valuable stuff an’ ran.”

“I wish I could’ve been there for ye, Jack,” Alannah said desperately. Her hand strayed to her pregnant belly. “I’m sorry ye had to spend all those years on the streets. I’m just happy God has brought ye back to me. Henryk an’ the kids an’ me, we will always be here. Ye don’t have to be alone anymore.”

“Ain’t nothin’ we can do about it, Aunt Alannah,” Jack said. “’Sides, I wasn’t alone. I had Crutchie an’ Race an’ my other newsie pals. They’s my family. I mean, sure, I went to prison a couple times, but I escaped an’ Snyder’s in jail now anyway. There’s only the future to look to.”

Alannah cupped his cheek. “Ye’re a smart lad, Jack. I should take your advice—I dwell too much in the past.”

“Not as smart as Davey,” Jack quipped. “Your kid came up with the idea to strike all on his own.”

Alannah laughed, then sobered. “What would ye think if I named this baby Cliona Frances, if it’s a girl? After my favorite sister an’ nephew?”

Jack thought about it for a long time. “Francis ain’t really my name anymore, Aunt Alannah. But… My da, he used to give her roses on Christmas an’ her birthday. When I see a rose, I think of her. Maybe name the kid Róisín?”

“Little rose,” Alannah murmured. “Róisín Jacobs. I like the way it sounds.”

Jack put a hand on Alannah’s stomach. “I can’t wait to meet youse, little Rosie. Prepare yourself, ‘cause your family’s _insane_.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That's a wrap, folks!
> 
> "Kelly the Boy From Killane" is one of my favorite songs. I highly recommend the version by The High Kings. 
> 
> Do you guys have any name suggestions for the newest Jacobs baby? I need ideas for boy names, especially. (Alannah may be having twins. You didn't hear it from me, though). I'm planning on writing a one-shot about Alannah giving birth. Expect that by the end of next week. There will be lots of fluff. Writing about Davey Jacobs interacting with small children may be my guilty pleasure. Sue me.


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